Don't Look Back
by emmiemac
Summary: Los Angeles 1947: After returning from the Pacific, Sandor Clegane settles as a cop in L.A. One night in a bar he sees a girl that he had tried so hard to forget. But Sansa Stark has changed and he is determined to discover why she has changed her name and appearance and will not reunite with what is left of her family. AU. Sex & violence & profanity. Sandor POV.
1. Chapter 1

**DISCLAIMER: **_This story is entirely based on characters from George R.R. Martin's _A Song of Ice and Fire

DON'T LOOK BACK

Seven days on duty and all Sandor wanted was a drink. _Only one,_ he swore to himself. And so he stopped in at a bar where he would not know anyone; or so he thought. When he saw her across the darkened room, his heart lurched: certain at first that it was his imagination. A dream. A mistake.

It had to be a mistake because a young lady of good family like Sansa Stark would not be sitting in a darkened bar in a seedy part of L.A. like this. She should be at a swanky nightclub, wearing a beautiful gown and jewels; or more likely at some college function where all the wealthy young kids dressed in summer whites and pretty girls wore orchid corsages to dances.

For Sansa Stark was really just a girl. A lovely, auburn-haired, blue-eyed girl with a delicate beauty and gentle manners; a product of her old-world upbringing and the finest girls' schools in San Francisco and later on Hawaii when her father came to help his old friend Robert Baratheon try to sort out the mess he had made of his business and estates. The self-titled Pineapple King had let strong drink and his wife Cersei's spending get out of hand. Beneath the façade of lavish living, he had gotten himself heavily in debt to his father-in-law, the oil baronTywin Lannister.

That's when the Stark girl had come into Sandor's life and done the impossible: she'd made him care. He was a big man with severe burn scars on his face that made him so horrible to look at that people turned away. Children cried and women cringed and averted their eyes. He'd lived inside a hard shell of anger and loneliness for so long that he had almost forgotten what it was to be anything but indifferent and even callous towards others.

He'd mocked her polite pleasantries and her happy, innocent nature. He'd once compared her to a little bird that chirped pretty words and fluttered around in gilded cages: so secure and sheltered it did not know how stupid it was. He had smirked when she had looked hurt, thinking she would learn soon enough. He had been right too: within a year her family would be decimated and her happy smiles and her trust in others would be gone, replaced by shadowed eyes full of grief and pain. All that was left to her was a pretty face and body and very likely the need to learn how to use them. But by then Sandor was gone. Fed up with the Lannisters, he decided to join the marines and either serve his country or die trying. In truth, he had hoped to die and when he didn't he came back angrier than ever. Why had good men died and he lived? He'd gone back to being muscle-for-hire for shady types and drinking himself into stupors off-duty. Finally he'd simply walked into the ocean one night; staggered really. But he'd fucked that up too: he'd washed up on the beach and was taken to dry out at a veteran's facility and counselled by a chaplain named John Elder; Elder brother, the vets all called him.

"You've been given your life, Sandor," the man had eyed him shrewdly but kindly, "reborn, almost. Might be you've got a purpose that you haven't figured out yet. You're tough. You're strong. Use it for something good."

"Like what" he'd challenged sneeringly. "Guarding douchebags? Killing Japs?"

"The war is over," the priest had replied levelly. "Who do you want to fight now?"

Sandor remembered his childhood: the sister he lost and the brother he hated. "The ones that hurt people," he rasped bitterly.

The chaplain nodded thoughtfully. "That's a good place to start, Sandor."

So he'd become a cop. His scars were still ugly, but a number of men had been disfigured in the war so they assumed he had been too; and though people still cringed, they did not judge or reject him. He'd been just over a year on the force but he'd risen fast: long hours and hard work and less drinking. He used his head as much as his muscle and he was straight too: no graft or bribes or dope or party girls for Officer Clegane. He'd seen what greed and moral relativism, a term of Elder brother's, did to people…people like Sansa Stark. And he'd stood by and let it happen to her; just as he had with his sister but he'd been a boy when his sister died and he had supposed to have been a man when Sansa was effectively held hostage by the Lannisters.

He saw her leave the bar that night with a man in uniform. He had been buying her drinks and squeezing her thigh under the table as he talked in her ear. A rhinestone clip held her hair back on one side and her dress was form-fitting and dark. She didn't encourage him but neither did she resist him or try to get away. As the man led her out the door, his hand trailed from the small of her back to her ass. Sandor saw red: he had wanted to follow them out and shoot the shit-for-brains dead for laying his mitts on Sansa like that. But it couldn't be her, he reassured himself as he lay in the dark on his bed or sat up in the tiny kitchen staring out the window into the night; the girl had been just another pretty girl with bad luck and no one to save her. This town was full of them.

Fucking idiot, who was he kidding? He'd lived and worked all over the western states before Hawaii, then fought in the Pacific. He'd never known any girl to look anything like Sansa Stark.

He went back three nights in a row and nursed a single scotch while keeping one eye on the door. He worked some overnight shifts before he could return; then he saw her again. This time she was already there when he arrived and she sat alone at the bar where her face was clearer in the light of the shaded lamp over the cash register. This time he knew: it was her.

She had dyed her hair brown, which was why he had thought his eyes had been playing tricks on him that first night. And she looked tired, he thought now; though only someone who had known her as a radiant girl could see it. She wore a flower-printed dress and her hair was parted deep on one side and fell forward over her face in waves, like that blonde Veronica Lake. Sansa's hair was dark now but her eyes were that deep blue she got from her Tully mother. She outlined them now with black liner, making them seductively cat-like, and her lips were a tantalizingly rich red that blew smoke out from her cigarette. Her long legs were tucked under the bar stool. She was still beautiful, but hers was a delicate type of beauty that got lost under the heavy makeup and would have looked oddly out of place in a dump like this. It was clear to him that she had come down in the world and was likely due to getting by on her own in a town that chewed up and spit out pretty girls; but every man in the place was looking at her, probably watching her drink and weighing their chances. They all turned away when Sandor approached her.

He cleared his throat. "It's been a long time," he rasped as he put his hand down on the bar next to hers.

She looked up at him with an unfocused curiosity and he saw that she was already drunk. Her hand with its long slender fingers idly twirled the cocktail glass on the bar beside her. Suddenly her pupils dilated with recognition and fear and she turned her face away. _Just like she did the first time, _he remembered grimly_._

"It has," she replied shortly. "Andy, bring me another whisky."

The bartender reached behind him for a bottle. "Whatever you say, Alayne."

"She's had enough, I'd say," Sandor called to him.

"Yea? And who are you to say?" the bartender inquired lazily.

Sandor flashed his badge. The bartender blanched and swallowed hard. Another man quickly slid up on the girl's other side.

"This guy bothering you, Alayne? Say the word and I'll protect you, baby; I'll do anything for you, you know that." He was awkward and eager. Sandor wondered if he was just another man she had left with, or one who watched her and dreamed of his chance. He jerked his head to warn the man to clear off.

"Just leave me alone," she answered thickly. "All of you."

She slipped gracefully off the barstool but tottered slightly on her heels before turning for the door. Sandor grabbed her arm and steadied her. "Let's go, girl."

She looked up at him. She looked momentarily like that lost and broken girl he remembered and then a cool, coy look came over her face. She gave a mirthless laugh and played up to him now. "Your place or mine…officer?"

"Yours, girl," he growled, "I'm taking you home…and don't you flirt with me neither. I could run you in for drinking underage, as it is I should beat sense into you for being in a place like this. What are you now: seventeen, eighteen?"

"I'm old enough to know what I'm doing. What do you think you're doing?" she slurred slightly and tried unsuccessfully to wretch her arm from his grip.

"Trying to keep you safe, girl," he rasped.

There was pause before she answered. "You're too late," he thought he heard her say but a bus had passed by as he opened the door and he wasn't sure and so he chose to ignore it.

She tripped outside as he led her out behind the bar. His Buick, bought second-hand from some B-actor who was out of work, was parked in the last spot.

"Easy now," he rasped as he tried to hold her up and open the rear door of the Buick at the same time. He prayed that she didn't puke so that he'd be stuck cleaning it up. He took her in his arms and carefully lowered her in. She lay sprawled out on the back seat, the skirt of her flowered print dress hitched above her knees. He gulped and looked down at her face. She was looking back languidly, as slight smirk on her full lips.

"You want me," she whispered. It was not a question. She slid her hands down her thighs and began to raise her skirt. The fabric slid against the silk of her stockings and Sandor caught a glimpse of garter before trying to stop her.

"Don't," he rasped harshly. "Don't do that."

"Why not? I know you want me…they all do," she scoffed softly. "I remember how you looked at me then. I see how you look at me now." She licked her lips. "It's alright…I'm not a little girl anymore," she mocked as she unhooked her garter.

Sandor saw the knowing look in her eyes and knew it was true. It hurt him to see it but he had grown painfully hard at the first sight of the milky white skin of the inside of her thigh. Still he hesitated. He had dreamed of seeing her again and keeping her safe; not having her like easy pickings in the back of a car behind a dive bar off the strip. But when she unhooked the other stocking from her garter, Sandor could not stop himself from reaching between her legs and groping at the soft skin of her thigh with a big calloused hand.

"Fuck me," he breathed when he felt the cool flesh. It seemed to melt in his hand, yielding to his touch.

"Yes," she laughed softly.

She's laughing at me, he thought angrily. The old rage returned, and his feelings for her with it. He pushed her thighs open with a growl and fell on top of her. His hands fumbled for his fly as she wiggled out of her panties. He tore them from her when she got them below her knees. Grabbing a fistful of her hair, thick and soft and, oh Christ, so wonderful to feel, he drove into her as hard as he could so that she cried out incoherently.

Sandor shut his eyes and grunted to feel her soft, wet, tight heat around his throbbing cock. He took a deep breath and began pumping her rhythmically. The girl sighed and gave a hum of contentment. Her legs fell open wider and she closed her eyes and leaned her head back on the leather seat.

"Come on, girl," he urged her through clenched teeth.

Sansa panted softly as she bucked her hips to his steady rhythm. She arched her back so that her breasts pressed into his chest and he felt how firm they were and how hard her nipples were through the light fabric. The sensation spurred him on faster and they were both reaching a fevered frenzy as the car rattled and shook and the springs of the back seat squeaked loudly beneath them.

"Yes, hard like that," Sansa whimpered, "harder, harder!"

In the faint light of the sign over the back door of the bar, he could see her tongue curl in her mouth as she moaned yearningly. She reached her arms over her head and latched onto the door handle. Her submissive abandon, her wantonness even, was so unlike the girl he had known and yet it unleashed a lust in him that made him come on like a runaway freight train. He grunted and fucked her harder.

"Jesus Christ, I'm coming, girl. Don't stop, don't you fucking stop."

His rhythmic pumping hitched and he thrust in hard, rough jerks that made her flinch with pain but still the girl bucked and churned against him until she shuddered and gasped sharply. Then she let go a gust of warm breath over his neck. Sandor clutched her thigh in a brutal grip and pushed into her deeply, mercilessly, with a savage need to possess her completely, to mark her as having been his, as a man plunges a stake into the ground to claim his territory.

He came when he did, with a deafening, drawn-out groan and a powerful spurting of semen from his cock that felt like a dam bursting. He kept all his weight on her as he kept on pulsing and throbbing, emptying himself into her. His release was so strong and so complete he almost sobbed from relief.

He raised his head now to look at her. Her head was turned away slightly, and her eyes were closed and her mouth was slack and open. He suspected that she had passed out.

"Sansa?" he murmured hoarsely.

After second she twitched slightly. "Hm?"

"Never mind, girl. I'll take you home."

"Hm." She settled again. He wondered where she thought home was. He adjusted and zipped himself before pulling her dress back down. He shut the rear car door and walked around to the driver's side, jiggling the keys in his pocket. He got behind the wheel and sighed. Then he turned on the ignition and drove to his place.


	2. Chapter 2

Sansa was conscious enough to be walking unsteadily again once they got there and Sandor helped her up the stairs into his apartment on the top floor. The small building was owned by an old ex-boxer and was run-down though clean. The man liked having a cop living there: between the two of them the other tenants caused no trouble.

She passed out again at the top of the stairs and Sandor lifted her and then set the girl down on top of the bed and spread a plaid blanket over her before going to the galley kitchen to make coffee.

_She'll be hungover_, he told himself; _might be she won't even remember what happened_.

He sat at the small table with its speckled top, staring out the open blind into the darkness of the alley. He thought about the girl; the girl and her family.

Her old man had been the second Stark son and so had struck out on his own from the family business to build his own fortune in lumber, land and the building trade. He was known for being scrupulously honest and though some mocked him, he had thrived enough to marry a Tully girl from a Colorado mining family: a beauty and wealthy in her own right. They had been a happy and successful family. The depression years hadn't ruined them though business had slowed. Stark's holdings had not been built on air from speculation and stocks but were solid, and his family was protected.

_Maybe too protected, _thought Sandor. He remembered the man arriving in Hawaii. As Baratheon's driver and bodyguard, he had taken Robert to meet his old friend who arrived on a ship with his daughter's in tow: a temporary arrangement, he planned to send them back to their mother before the New Year of 1942. The little dark one, Sandor had forgotten her name even before she disappeared, had been feisty and sullen in equal measure: always wanting to roughhouse outside with the native Hawaiian kids. Sandor could see Cersei sneering and forbidding her precious Myrcella and even her youngest boy Tom from playing with her. But Sansa…

Sansa had been polite and soft-spoken, with gentle ways and a precociously lady-like quality that enhanced her very feminine beauty. Despite her youth, men's eyes followed her. The girl smiled at them, cheerfully unaware of any evil or danger in the world. Her father saw though, Sandor was certain of it; and when the oldest boy Joffrey started sniffling around her, old man Stark moved up the day his daughters would sail back to the mainland. But before he could, another bodyguard shot him as he returned to the property late one night. It was hushed up and handled discreetly, of course. Right after Pearl Harbor, people were jumpy and looking for enemies and so what was officially deemed an unfortunate accident of an overzealously protective hired gun was not questioned too closely by anyone, at least anyone on Hawaii.

Robert died the next day in hospital when he was told. Stark had been visiting with him after he'd had a massive heart attack from drinking and gorging himself on wild boar at a luau. He'd wanted to give control of the company over to Stark, "until he recovered"; but he'd been dumb enough say so in front of Cersei who had wanted the company for her father, or, better still, herself. Robert had begun to suspect the children weren't his. Christ, thought Sandor now, he'd have to have been blind drunk not to have noticed before.

The girls were left with Cersei then; after Pearl there was a long wait to book civilian passage off the island, or so the bitch told their mother, and she was in no hurry to return the Stark daughters to their family. Cersei didn't much care when the little one ran off but she watched Sansa like a hawk and set Sandor to shadowing her. She had the run of the house and could ride on the estate but Cersei would not permit her to leave. She told the girl it was too dangerous now to sail to the mainland or even leave the estate; she wouldn't want to get killed like her father. Sansa understood the threat, though not the reason. She did not know that Cersei had only her father's money and that Tywin Lannister kept her on a short leash. Cersei wanted Sansa's trust fund or better still her father's company. Her older brother had joined the Marines the day after Pearl Harbor, just before their father was killed; and Cersei must have hoped he would die too and leave Sansa next in line for Winterfell Incorporated.

The eldest boy had died, and their mother too. They had travelled to Boston so the boy could marry his college sweetheart before going overseas and they had all burned to death in the Coconut Grove fire. The crippled boy was in a special school; the youngest was sent to boarding school by an aunt but he too had run off. But none of that served to explain why the girl had come to L.A., why she had dyed her hair and changed her name. He didn't think the Lannisters would be looking for her. And then there was what happened tonight. Clearly, the girl was on intimate terms with men; was that how she'd got away and come this far? Even if it was, he would not blame her; but surely she could do better now than drinking in dives and spreading her legs for deadbeats. And why would she have done so for him? He set his empty coffee cup down in the saucer.

He turned his head to the bedroom and then rose to go look. The bed was rumpled but empty and he could hear water running in the bathroom. The girl dried her hands and face on a towel and bent to re-attach her stockings to her garters. She ran her hands quickly over her legs to straighten the seams and check for runs; then she looked sharply in the mirror and smoothed down her dress.

"Your panties are in my car," he rasped now. "I'll fetch them up for you." If the girl didn't remember what happened in the back of his car, she would surely realize it now.

She turned and looked at him and for a moment, as though she still could not believe it was him; and in that moment she looked vulnerable and uncertain. Then she set her mouth and shrugged one shoulder with a practiced carelessness.

"I'll go home without them," she replied coolly as she walked towards him now, "it wouldn't be the first time."

Blinded by jealous anger, he grabbed her wrists and pushed her to the wall. She blinked rapidly and looked down, as though expecting a blow. Instead he leaned in to her, drawn by her lovely face and that fucking dark hair. It cascaded down one shoulder in waves, like a starlet in a picture from LIFE magazine. He missed the glorious, rich red of her auburn but the dark dye gave her a mysterious air that aroused and disappointed him at the same time: it was her, and it wasn't.

"Are you not done with me?" she questioned tightly. "Is that why you brought me here?"

He released her wrists and ran his hands up her arms to her shoulders and neck. His eyes dropped to her breasts, heaving gently from heavy breaths as she struggled with her fear. She did not know what to make of him yet.

All of his questions could wait: she was so close, and even with her whisky breath and the lingering smell of smoke in her hair she was fragrant and sweet.

"No, girl," he breathed heavily, "I'm not done with you."

Seeing where his eyes had fallen, she reached tentatively to unbutton her dress. He watched as she opened it to the waist and pushed it off one shoulder. Beneath she had only a silky camisole, and so he stilled her hands and slipped one of the thin straps off her shoulder as well. She stared back at him steadily, almost challengingly.

Sandor stepped closer, pressing her into the wall behind her as he raised his hand to her exposed breast. He circled it with his fingertip, brushed it with his palm and then rubbed the dark pinknipple with his thumb. The girl bit her lip and trembled but kept staring at him: she was letting him have his way though she did not trust him. The excitement was making him incredibly hard.

Sandor returned her steady gaze now. His scarred mouth twitched as he reached under her dress and ran his hands over her bare ass beneath the elastic of her garter. He squeezed and groped her behind until finally Sansa raised her arms over her head against the wall. She closed her eyes and moaned from want.

"You like this, girl?" he breathe on her neck as he leaned even closer. "You want me to fuck you again."

"Mm…hit me," she whispered breathily.

"What?" His head came up to look at her.

"Hit me, hurt me," she murmured. "You know you want to."

Sandor grabbed her chin in his hand so that she opened her eyes and he looked at her angrily.

"What the fuck, girl?"

She was flushed and confused.

"You said that you should beat sense into me. Well, here I am: beat me!"

He stared at her in bewilderment.

She pushed him in his chest with the flat of her hands. "Go on!"

"Sans-"

She moved away from him warily. "You don't want me. What _do_ you want?"

He grabbed her arm again. "Now, wait-"

She pulled her arm away and slapped him then and he backhanded her instinctively. Hard. She flew back from him and fell to the floor in a crumpled heap, her hair hanging over her face. There was a long, very quiet moment and Sandor stared in pained shock at what he had done. He heard her sniffle.

"Is that it?" she asked him flatly.

"Is that it?" he repeated, dumbfounded. "Sansa, I- I'm sorry." He walked to her and tried to help her up but she pushed his hand away without looking up. "Sansa I never wanted to hurt you, you of all people. Let me help you, girl."

"I'm not a girl," she muttered from behind her hair, "and I don't need your help."

Sandor kneeled next to her now. "Sansa, please..."

Her head whipped up and he saw the red mark next to her mouth and the bloody mucus dripping from her nostril. She would have an ugly bruise on that delicate white skin, Sandor knew; he'd seen her with many before this.

"My name is Alayne," she insisted. She fumbled to button her dress now.

"Fine," he sighed, "you're Alayne…at least let me take you home now."

"No," she replied simply. She stood slowly to steady herself and smoothed her dress again.

Sandor stood as well and towered over her despite her height and her high heels.

"Then I'll run you in for drinking underage…and when they check and find there is no Alayne they'll run a background-"

She closed her eyes and put her hands over her ears.

"Damn you," she nearly sobbed. "I gave you what you wanted. Why can't you leave me alone?"

He grabbed her wrists and pulled her hands away from her ears. "I did leave you alone once, little bird…and this is how it's turned out," he rasped.

She shook her head wearily as tears brimmed in her eyes. She knew she had no choice.

"It's alright," he soothed her now. "It will be alright."

But Sansa…Alayne…closed her eyes tightly and shook her head again. "No, it won't."

….

He drove her home in silence. She had a room in a boarding house and the old woman who ran it looked at Sandor suspiciously when he helped her up the sagging porch.

"Alayne," the woman asked with a heavy accent, "this man hurt you?"

Sandor showed his badge. "Some man did," he replied easily. "I've brought her home. Can she have a bath?"

"Poor, sweet girl," the woman murmured concernedly. "You come sit; I run water. You no work today."

The girl smiled gently and wearily. "I'm afraid the coffee shop may not agree-"

"But your face," the old lady winced.

"Makeup will cover it," she answered like she knew which of course she did. She sat stiffly in the other ratty, weathered wicker hair on the porch.

"Coffee shop?" Sandor questioned flatly once the woman had left them.

Sansa smirked. "Sunnyside Coffee and Luncheon: open 24 hours." She shrugged that indifferent shrug again. "They were kind enough to take a chance on me. Girls' school doesn't prepare you for real life…though you knew that long before I did, didn't you?"

Sandor shook his head now. "For you sake, girl, I wish I'd been wrong."

She raised her head to look at him. "But you weren't."

"Your family-"

"Are gone. Please, don't talk about them." She gripped her hands together tightly and stared at the rotting plank floor of the porch. Her face was determined but her eyes were vacant and sad.

He took a deep breath and sighed out his nose. "How did you get away from the Lannisters?"

She examined her folded hands now. "Petyr Baelish," she replied quietly. "He said my mother's family had taken him in as a boy; he wanted to repay their kindness by helping me. Cersei had no use for me anymore by then; not after Joffrey got engaged to a Tyrell."

Sandor snorted with satisfaction. The spoiled boy had tormented Sansa after her father was killed; threatening to come to her room at night and having some of the other guards strike her for his own amusement when she would not smile readily enough for him. Cersei never stopped it; she felt it kept the girl in her place. Then Margery Tyrell had come to Hawaii from Louisiana to bring her wounded brother home but stayed when she met Joffrey. The night before their wedding he had gotten so drunk with his groomsmen that he'd passed out and choked on his own vomit. Cersei had tried to convince anyone who would listen that her precious boy had been poisoned but her father warned her if she did not stop making outrageous claims that he would have her committed to an asylum. Sandor wondered fleetingly if she was still there.

"I stayed in his home and worked at the canteen with the soldiers, serving them coffee and donuts and asking about them, where they were from and so on; telling them what sights to visit," she smiled wistfully. "There was a young man, a Marine from Alabama who wanted to call on me. I think he truly cared for me…" She dropped her eyes now. "But Petyr put stop to that. He wanted me to marry his first wife's son when I came of age: a sickly, weak boy, and plaintive but Petyr had control of him and his finances. It was my trust fund he wanted really, or perhaps even part of Winterfell Incorporated. When- when I told him I wouldn't marry a boy I didn't love, he- he locked me in his shed and left me there in the heat." She wiped at her bloodied nose with her fingertips. "He brought that Payne man from the estate, the- the one who killed my father, and had him beat me until I vomited blood and blacked out. 'Leave her face', Petyr had told him though; 'we want her pretty.'"

"And?" Sandor prompted when she faltered.

"It was Harry, the young Marine who found me. He'd come looking for me when I hadn't show up for days, and took me to the home of a family he knew. He told me to use his mother's name: Alayne Stone. He gave me all his money and told me to get to the mainland. He- he said he'd find me after the war but…he's gone now," she whispered faintly, "Iwo Jima."

"Many never even made it off the beach," Sandor rasped quietly.

"Where you there?" she asked him now.

"No," he answered flatly and paused. "Okinawa."

She turned to look at him now and nodded slowly.

Sandor thought of Elder brother, who had helped him when he had been in so much pain that he could no longer bear it. He realized that Sansa needed the same help. "You're young, girl," he rasped, "I know it's been hard and you've lost people but-"

"I've lost everyone. They leave me…and they don't come back." Her voice was faint and far-away though she sat across from him.

Sandor stood now and made to leave. He knew where to find her now.

"I came back," he told her. He crossed to the steps and started heading back to his car. "And I will again."


	3. Chapter 3

Sandor walked into the records office at the main police station and flashed his identification.

"I'm working a missing person's," he rasped, "off the record."

The clerk jerked his head towards the enormous room filled with endless jumbled rows of files and boxes.

"Good luck," he jeered.

Maybe he should have left it alone; but something in the girl's story was missing. She did have family somewhere: her father had an illegitimate bastard son whom he had sent to live with an old army buddy from the trenches. The boy was raised in Alaska by old Mormont and his sister. Sandor didn't know if the boy'd fought in the war or if he'd come back but he meant to find out. Might be he'd know about the missing two: the little sister and the youngest boy.

Her mother's parents were dead but she had an uncle who owned the mines now and a great-uncle who apparently ran the show. "Blackfish" Tully had been the only man to face up to the Lannisters and demand his niece's daughters back when the mother was killed. Between his family's mines and the Lannisters' oil fields and a war on, the authorities hadn't known who to back so they'd sent old Blackfish to Europe with the Italian campaign, leaving the matter conveniently unresolved. Sandor knew in his gut that one phone call or cable would bring the man to L.A. for the girl. So why did she not contact him? What in the hell was she running from or why was she hiding?

_You want me. Hit me, hurt me. You know you want to._

A pretty little bird like Sansa Stark believing men wanted to hurt her. He shook his head. Someone had fucked with her mind, Cersei for certain and probably Baelish too: Sandor has always thought he was a warped fucker with that oily charm and van dyke beard, like a silent film villain. He was greedier and more ambitious than even Cersei; just better at hiding it. But she'd been fucked for real too; and not gently either, if he were to go by her expectations. He tore his mind away from all that.

Sandor rolled up his sleeves and dug through files and boxes, occasionally going back to the clerk to ask questions. The man, despite his jeers, was helpful. But he came up empty: nothing on file under either Sansa Stark or Alyane Stone, either as criminal or victim. If she'd broken any laws here in L.A., she hadn't been caught; if she'd been harmed, she hadn't reported it. It didn't much narrow things down but it was a start.

Nothing on the missing family either; at least, not under the Stark name. He'd need to find out what he could about the Tullys; make sure old Blackfish wasn't bedridden and pissing himself in some vets' hospital.

Sandor picked up a bottle and a corned beef sandwich on the way back to his apartment.

Hours later, the sandwich was cold and the bottle remained unopened though both sat before him on the kitchen table where he stared out into the night brooding, as he was wont to do. He could not tear his mind from the girl: her soft skin and hair, her heat when he fucked her, and her eyes which were sometimes vacant, sometimes coy but always with that deep and haunting sadness.

_No, girl; I'm not done with you._

He got up and took the bottle to the highest shelf in the cupboard and pushed it to the back.

By week's end, he finally had a secretary find him an address: Sunnyside Coffee and Luncheon. It was still light when he pulled the Buick up to the curb and saw her through the window. She was behind the counter adding up a bill, her lovely brow furrowed in concentration. Then she walked through a swinging door he assumed led to the kitchen. He walked in then and sat in a corner. He saw her walk out again and set a cream pie under a glass dome on the counter. His mouth twitched to see her working so diligently.

She wore the standard waitress' uniform: plain, pale yellow buttoned dress with a white apron and stiff white little hat. Her long legs looked shapely even in those flat, lace-up shoes like nurses wore; and her dark hair was twisted and pinned at the base of her slim neck. Smile and nod, smile and nod: the girl remembered her courtesies and was grateful for the nickels and dimes people left for her under dirty plates and crumpled paper napkins. She scraped the coins towards the table or counter's edge and tucked them neatly into her apron pocket.

She was flipping over the page of her little order pad when she approached him and stopped short when she saw that it was him sitting at the table with his legs sticking out into the aisle. Her name was stitched in black on the pocket of her uniform: Alayne. She looked apprehensive.

"Coffee: black," he ordered firmly before she could speak or react. "What's that pie you brought out?"

"Um, coconut cream pie," she recovered though her smile was forced.

"I'll take a piece."

She nodded politely and walked away quickly. He watched her with the glass dome and pie knife and thought he could see her hands tremble. But when she set the plate and cup before him, she was steady.

"Anything else, officer?"

He put two dollar bills down. She eyed them coolly and took one. After ringing it in, she brought him his change. He took her wrist and she gasped quietly.

"I want to talk again," he rasped low. "Not here. When do you finish?"

"Midnight…but the next girl is always late," she replied and looked furtively over her shoulder.

"Then I'll wait."

She looked at him warily and he knew she was wondering what he wanted but he did not tell her. Let her get nervous, he thought: she might let something slip.

It was a quiet time in the coffee shop: well after lunch and too soon for evening diners, and though the place emptied quickly, he did not speak with her again. Instead, he watched her wipe tabletops and re-fill the napkin holders and the glass dispensers of paper straws. She filled the sugar bowls and salt and pepper shakers, and he caught glimpses of that old ladylike delicacy that he had seen when she was at fancy teas and formal dinners in Hawaii. Then he remembered the back seat of his car and thought of bending her over a table and pulling up her skirt. Christ, he wanted to hear her moan again. His eyelids grew heavy and his cock grew hard. He shifted in his seat and the chair scraped against the tile floor. She looked up. Just then the bell over the door jingled as a young couple walked in to sit at the counter. Sansa nodded and smiled to them.

Fuck it, he decided. He stood with his jacket folded over his arm to cover his hard-on and walked past her and out the door into the warm evening. The change she had brought him was still on the table, along with the other dollar bill.

When he returned at midnight, the joint was full: rowdy young people crammed around tables littered with milkshake glasses and plates of french-fries and tradesmen and shift workers drinking coffee and eating plates of fried eggs and sausages, sopping up runny yolks with wedges of toast. A heavy blonde was clearing dishes and wiping tables. He could see Sansa behind the cash register counting receipts. She looked up when the door jingled.

"She was on time," he rasped.

"For a change," Sansa almost smiled genuinely. She clipped her receipts together and placed them in an envelope with a wad of cash.

Sandor frowned. "Is that safe for you to carry around?"

Sansa shook her head. "It's not mine; it's the total from my shift. The night cook will keep it safe until the bank opens in the morning."

Just then a huge man stuck his head out the kitchen door. He was of a height with Sandor but much burlier; the only bigger man Sandor had ever seen had been his brother.

"Ready, Miss Alayne?" He held his hand out for the envelope.

"Thank you, Hodor. Good night."

"Good night, Miss Alayne." The man clearly adored her, and so his eyes strayed to Sandor. Sandor nodded reassuringly. Hodor nodded back and returned to the kitchen.

Sansa crossed her arms over her chest and looked up at him.

"Let's go," he said simply.

If she was surprised that he took her back to his apartment, she hid it well. She stood inside the door and waited.

"Can I get you anything?" he asked.

"A drink," she answered too quickly. He headed to the kitchen and found the bottle he had shoved out of sight. He rinsed a glass and poured; only half-full, and carried it out to where he left her but she was no longer there.

"What the fuck?" he muttered. Then he heard water running and stuck his head into the bedroom. She had left her uniform on a chair and was showering in his tiny bathroom. He took the drink back to the kitchen and waited.

She came in quietly moments later with damp hair and wrapped in his robe which covered her calves. The sleeves were rolled up but still hid her hands. She had washed off her makeup and now he could see the dark bruise near her mouth. It made him feel like shit. It made him want to kiss her.

He pushed her drink across the table to her. She picked it up and fidgeted with it.

"Why am I here?" she asked him finally. She was wearing nothing but his own bathrobe, and he had made no move to touch her.

"Your mother's uncle has been trying to track you; you and your sister. But he's got his people looking in Hawaii. Your youngest brother is with him now, living on the Tully ranch in Colorado."

Sansa's eyes widened and her face softened noticeably. "Rickon," she breathed. Then her face shut down again and she looked down at her glass. "Thank goodness he's safe. I'm glad for him. Thank you for telling me." She drank now, emptying the glass by half.

"He'd come for you too if you called; or I did," he rasped.

"No."

"He's your family; he'll take care of you," he reasoned as she shook her head stubbornly. "You were born to better than this, girl. Why are you throwing it away?"

"Why do you care?" she challenged. "What am I to you?"

He stepped closer to her. "I didn't help you then-"

"I didn't let you," she reminded him. "And you can't help me now; I don't want you to, please. Can't you just forget me? I'm not that girl anymore."

He reached out to her but she flinched. He reached again, running the pads of his calloused fingers from her temple to her jaw and raising her chin so that she was looking up at him.

"No," he murmured, "you're not."

Seemingly resolved, Sansa set the glass onto the table and walked into his bedroom. Sandor followed. The light of the full moon shone faintly around the blind, giving her milky skin a bluish tinge when she opened his robe and let it drop to the floor. She was prefect: rounded shoulders, firm round breasts, a narrow waist and those long, shapely legs he dreamed about. He bent to kiss her gently; then he ran his thumb over the bruise next to her mouth. When he pulled back, she was looking up into his eyes searchingly. He wondered if she would see that she could trust him. Whatever she saw, she turned to crawl onto the bed and he saw her lovely round ass and a livid bruise on her pale thigh.

"Did I do that?" he asked.

She turned to him and he jerked his chin to her rear. Sansa looked down and saw the bruise and shrugged.

"Does it matter?" she asked resignedly.

_It should_, he thought.

"Stay like that," he told her instead. He walked to the bed and looked at her before running his hands down her back and over her behind to feel the cool smooth skin he had only left fleetingly in the back seat of his Buick. He climbed onto the bed behind her and lowered the suspenders from his shoulders.

"They used to call me Joffrey's dog," he reminded her. "When I started trailing you, they called me your hound." He unzipped slowly.

"I remember," she murmured.

"I liked watching you ride best," he told her, his voice tight with lust. "Watching your ass bounce in the saddle on your little mare." He was caressing her behind; then kneading it in his gripped hands as she arched her back invitingly.

"I like stallions now," she told him huskily.

He reached into his pants and drew out his engorged cock. "Then I'll fuck you like a stallion," he rasped. He brought the head of his cock to her behind and slid it down to her opening to find it slick and wet. He bent over her and pushed in slowly and saw her hands grip the bedclothes tightly.

"Is that good?'" he rasped in her ear.

Sansa nodded rapidly and whimpered. She pushed her body back towards him.

"Easy, girl," he whispered hoarsely, "slow and easy."

He slid in and out of her languidly and his hands roamed her body. He caressed her breasts, cupping them in his hands and circling the nipples with his fingers. He ran his hands down her arms and back and reached to trace circles inside her soft thighs. She spread her knees wider and rocked her body, undulating her torso so that her hips tilted up to him in time to his slow thrusts. Sandor leaned back and watched in the dim light as his veined cock worked into her over and over.

"Oh, Christ," he moaned. _I'm fucking Sansa Stark…and she loves it._

She had turned her head so as to look at him over her shoulder. Her eyelids were heavy from lust and she was biting her lower lip and dragging it through her teeth. She had brought one hand up from the bed to grasp the headboard and she had begun to whine yearningly, like a puppy wanting a treat.

"I'll make you come, girl," he breathed now and slid his hand between her legs to find the sensitive knot over her opening. He fingered and rubbed it in time to his thrusts until she threw her head back and gasped.

"Oh, Sandor," she cried now.

The sound of his name on her lips made him come. He grasped her hips and pulled her back over his cock and pushed as deeply into her as he could. He jerked and groaned as he reached his release and felt himself spurt into her warmth. Slowly he let himself collapse over her. He rubbed her arm and kissed her shoulder.

"Bloody fucking hell, girl: what you do to me…I could do it forever."

She did not answer, she only breathed steadily beneath him.

"You alright?" he rasped.

She nodded. "Mm, I can't stay," she whispered now.

He tensed involuntarily and she felt it. "You're not my hound anymore," she told him. "You can't follow me everywhere."

He turned her over by pulling her arm and looked at her in the dimness.

"Why didn't you come with me when I offered?" he asked now. He had snuck into her room to tell her he was leaving and said he'd get her out if she wanted. There was a convent on the Island from the days of the missionaries; he'd leave her there and they could contact her family.

She looked back at him and shook her head. "You know my father's death wasn't an accident, Sandor. You know they weren't going to let me get away." She reached out to put her hand on his scarred cheek as she had done that night; after he had hoarsely raged at her that she was stupid, that he should beat sense into her, that no good would ever come of her staying. She'd put her soft hand on his scarred face and said that she'd pray for him to come through the war safely. "The Lannisters were killers; you know that because you told me. You did what you could, Sandor; I couldn't let you be killed like my father…and I couldn't be yours: not then, and not now."

He hung his head now. She had known then, known that he wanted to save her and to protect her; but he'd also wanted her; not then of course, she was still too young, but someday. He could see then the beautiful woman she would become. But that was then, clearly everything had changed now. He put his large hand over hers and gripped it tightly.

"Why not now? What about this?" She was naked on his bed and he'd fucked her like a dog; he did not have to explain what _this_ meant.

She shook her head sadly.

"Why can't you be mine now?" he demanded.

She spoke with infinite sadness. "Because you want Sansa Stark; and I can never be Sansa Stark again."


	4. Chapter 4

His days were filled with work: crime scenes, belligerent suspects and tearful victims, endless interviews and reports and even one court appearance. But his sleepless nights were full of thoughts of Sansa: not the auburn-haired girl she had been, with her prim manners and dainty smiles and love of everything beautiful; but the dark-haired temptress with the husky whisper and lush naked body that bucked beneath his when he had taken her. Might be she didn't want him around but she sure as hell made him want to see her again.

Days passed before he could not help himself anymore. On a Saturday morning he drove by the coffee shop only to be told by the night cook, Hodor, who was leaving in the early hours, that Sansa, _Alayne_ he remember to call her, had the day off. When he parked out front of the boarding house later, he saw her sweeping the front porch in the morning sun. She wore a faded yellow and white checked dress with a full skirt and sleeveless top. Her hair was twisted and pinned again. She was barefoot, which made him grin stupidly. He got out and started up the walk.

"And why are you working on your day off?" he rasped.

She turned and hesitated, wondering how he knew; then resigned herself to his presence.

"I help the landlady clean," she replied, "she's elderly, and it keeps the rent down."

"You have a trust fund, girl. Why are you sweeping floors in a boarding house and slinging hash at a diner?"

She stopped sweeping and closed her eyes a moment. "Sandor-" she began softly.

"Ah, you policeman come back," the landlady opened the front screen door with a jarring screech of rusty hinges. "You find man who hurt her?"

Sandor squinted to look at her and back to Sansa. "I will," he replied firmly.

Sansa looked to him warily. Clearly, there was a great deal about her that she did not want him to find. So instead he looked her over from head to heels with a twitch of a smile. "You look like you should be at the beach."

"Ah, good idea," the landlady enthused brightly. Sandor was starting to like her. "You go to beach, Alayne. Is beautiful day. You work too hard," she scolded mildly. "Pretty girl needs fun, yes?"

"Pretty girl needs rent money." But she smiled self-deprecatingly.

"You paid up this month," the old woman patted Sansa's arm. "You go. You no worry so much."

Still, she hesitated. _She'll fuck me but she won't trust me,_ Sandor thought grimly.

"I'll leave you to your sweeping then," he answered more harshly than he had intended and turned away.

"Go," he heard the landlady whisper urgently to Sansa. "He good man. He _like _you."

"Sandor….wait!" He turned back to her. She sighed audibly. "I'll just be a minute," she promised and went through the screeching screen door.

When she came back out on the porch, he saw that she had unpinned her hair. She was wearing harlequin sunglasses and rope-soled sandals that wrapped around her ankles. She carried an old straw bag with faded cloth flowers on the handle. She looked poor and shabby. She looked good enough to eat. Sandor remembered the exclusive yacht and beach club in Hawaii, with the candy-stripped pavilions for changing, the paid attendants who parked cars, handed out towels and locker keys and served drinks on silver trays. He used to sit at a bar in a room reserved for other members of the help: chauffeurs, nannies, secretaries. They were a long way from those days; he knew that he didn't give a rat's ass but he wondered if somewhere deep down the girl did. He didn't think she'd be like to tell him though; any more than she'd be like to tell him anything…unless he put her in handcuffs. But that image was suddenly exciting to him and so he wrenched his mind away.

He held the car door and she slid in gracefully, her well-bred habits so ingrained that she likely didn't know there was any other way. He still puzzled over her seedier behavior: the bar, the drink, the easy sex. Maybe it wasn't such a fucking mystery as he thought it was: these were the things people did to kill their pain. But he didn't see it helping her any more than it had helped him.

And she was determined to stay hidden, to live the rest of her miserable life as Alayne Stone. Sandor flipped down the eyeshade against the glaring sunshine, turned the key in the ignition and headed towards the nearest beach.

On the way there, he pulled over at a busy diner and came back with wrapped turkey sandwiches and two bottles of lemonade. It was windier at the beach and so she helped him to spread out the tartan blanket in the sand and then took a yellow kerchief from her straw bag and tied it around her hair. They unwrapped their lunch and Sandor uncorked the bottles.

"Sunny days," he toasted as he clinked his lemonade with hers. She laughed at him. "What?" he rasped.

"Sandor Clegane, the Hound, toasting sunny days at the beach," she shook her head and took a dainty bite of a dill pickle.

"Sansa Stark in a worn dress and cheap shoes, struggling to pay the rent," he shot back bitterly and she dropped her eyes penitently.

"Alayne Stone, you mean," she countered softly after a moment. "She's never known better…so don't cry for her, officer; and don't try to save her either. Alayne Stone gets by very well on her own."

"We can debate the 'very well' part, girl; but you work hard," he conceded now. "Never would have thought you'd had it in you but you don't even complain, do you?"

"There wouldn't be any point, would there?" She challenged mildly. "And you shouldn't be surprised: my father built his own life and business-"

"Sansa Stark's father built his own business," he retorted firmly. "Your great-uncle has his people running things now," Sandor continued. "Running things until your brothers come of age. Your father's bastard is on the GI bill, studying to take over, I'll wager; and the cripple is sharp too, they say."

Sansa was quiet a long time as she stared out at the ocean.

"I'm happy for Jon; for my father's sake. We were never close but he deserves a better place in the world. And Bran was always clever," she said without looking at him. "The accident took the use of his legs, not his brain…or his spirit. My mother always said so."

He waited before speaking again. When she did not go on, he told her about Elder brother.

"A chaplain in the vet's hospital used to quote an army doctor who worked with amputees; he'd say: ifyou want sympathy you'll find it in the dictionary…somewhere between _shit_ and _syphilis_."

Sansa gave a short snort of laughter. "Were you wounded, Sandor?" she asked now.

"Not a scratch," he muttered. "Don't seem hardly fair."

"I don't expect life to be fair," she replied curtly. "How did you know this chaplain?"

He paused. "Tried to off myself," he told her truthfully, hoping that it might make her trust him, "after the war. First with drink," he continued, ignoring her stare from behind the harlequin glasses, "then finally tried to finish myself once and for all around here somewhere." He glanced up and down the beach. "Walked into the water with no intention of coming out again; not alive anyway."

Sansa's mouth tightened and he saw her wring her hands together.

"I'm sorry, Sandor; truly. I- I'm glad you didn't succeed."

"Are you?" he wondered archly. "You wouldn't have me bothering you if I had. Reminding you you're Sansa, not this Alayne girl…"

"And so they put you in a- a hospital?"

He thought about it. "I was in a ward while I dried out," he answered, "dry heaves, shakes, nutty ramblings," he shrugged dismissively. Elder brother asked about the name Sansa; Sandor had told him it was something a dying Jap had whispered after Sandor had found him. _I put him out of his misery_, he muttered darkly and the chaplain had not asked again. "After that he set me to helping other guys: pushing wheelchairs, organizing card games and movie nights, reading books and newspapers to the blind vets," he mocked now and trailed off.

"And you became a police officer?"

"I did."

"No wife and family though," she mentioned neutrally.

"Never any time," he rasped. "Maybe someday." He looked back at her.

"Not for me." She spoke with the same level finality she used when she refused to discuss her family.

"So sure, are you?"

"I am." She busied herself wrapping up their lunch leavings.

He gave up…for now. "Come," he offered is hand as he stood. "Let's walk."

She picked up her bag and he draped the blanket over his arm so that they would walk hand-in-hand down the beach. Isn't that what lovers did, he wondered; if that was in fact what they were now. At least the girl didn't pull away.

They passed old couples and families with children and despite her reticence and cynicism, she smiled to see them. They passed bright kites and beach balls and sandcastles and Sandor stopped to buy her an ice cream from a shack on the boardwalk. He got hard watching her lick at the dripping vanilla cone and she dropped her eyes when she saw him staring. When they stood to walk again, she was the one to take him by the hand.

As they walked, they talked about the Cold War, as they were now calling the tensions with the Soviets, and about the Truman doctrine. They talked about the Black Dahlia, which made Sandor's guts clench when he looked at her dark hair. They talked about Jackie Robinson. They talked in circles about anything and nothing until they came to a deserted part of the beach with a cluster of leaning, weather-beaten change huts. Sansa chose the furthest one and drew Sandor in by the hand.

Inside, she took the blanket from him and let in drop before kneeling at his feet and unzipping his trousers. He was still hard. She kissed and tongued the head of his cock expertly, making him even harder; then she looked up into his eyes as she drew his thick shaft into her mouth.

"God, girl," he groaned. She held the base of him as she bobbed her head up and down his cock, sucking from her cheeks and flicking him with her tongue. He sank his hands into her hair and leaned back on the wall of the hut, hoping it would not collapse. He caressed her hair and face as he panted and grit his teeth to keep from crying out. Finally she pumped faster and hummed loudly and the vibration sent him over the edge.

"Stop, girl: I'm coming," he rasped.

But she kept on working his cock and so he grasped both sides of her head and thrust into her mouth until he came like gunshot and her mouth closed tightly as she sucked deep and swallowed. His mind reeled and he struggled to stay standing until he felt her slide her mouth away. He eased his grip on her head and let go.

Sansa was searching through her bag, her head bent. Sandor reached into his pocket and handed her a handkerchief. She took it without looking at him and wiped her mouth and dabbed under her eyes.

"There's a mirror up there," he told her and she turned to look. There was a broken shard of mirror still hanging from a nail but Sansa swiped it with the hankie and examined her face before reaching back into the flowered straw bag and twisting a lipstick. She applied the peachy-pink color and rubbed her lips together.

"Oh dear, I think I'm sunburned," she murmured now, touching her nose.

He pointed. "Your arms too," he added lamely. He guessed she did not want to discuss her four-star blowjob skills, or how she got them. He picked up the blanket and shook sand out of it. "I-"

She turned to him. "What?"

He nodded vaguely toward her skirt. "I can do for you, you know," he rasped.

She smiled her practiced coy smile. It left him cold. "I'm sure you can," she murmured seductively. "But I need to get back," she added, trying not to sound too dismissive.

"Right," was all he said.

When he dropped her off, he didn't get out of the car. If she noticed, she pretended that she didn't. "Thank you for a lovely day," she told him and he nodded brusquely.

He stopped the Buick at the corner for some kids on bicycles and his eyes flickered to the rear-view mirror. A soldier, a Marine, had appeared from nowhere and stopped her before she went into the boardinghouse and had her by the arm. He saw that her smile was strained and that, judging by his size, he was the same man from the bar when he saw her for the first time. He was only slightly taller than Sansa but he was broad and thick in the neck, arms and legs, like a bull. Though the soldier's hand dug into her arm roughly, she turned to him and spoke earnestly; without her usual evasiveness. Now he saw her nod in agreement to something he had said and the man let her go and walked away, turning to look at her again with narrowed eyes before walking up the street and climbing into a tan Ford. Sansa waited until he had left and went up the rickety steps to the porch and disappeared into the boarding house.

He didn't climb so fast in the police force by not trusting his instincts. He trusted them now.

Sandor didn't like what he saw; not one bit.


	5. Chapter 5

It was sundown before she walked off the porch again. She was wearing the same dark, form-fitting dress she had worn the first time he'd seen her, and high-heeled shoes with ankle straps. She had powdered away her sunburn and given herself those dark-rimmed cat's eyes and red lips and Veronica Lake hair again, with the sparkly little rhinestone clip.

Dressed to kill, he thought now; _femme fatale_ the papers called the women in these new crime movies they were calling _film noir. _Sandor had never seen one. He didn't need to; he saw enough crime in this city without forking over his hard-earned money to watch it for entertainment.

At the end of her street she sat on a bench and waited for a city bus. The warm evening was full of the smell of blooms from gardens and flowering trees, and the sky was colored by a soft orange and pink glow that outlined her shapely silhouette. She was a picture, but he closed his eyes against her beauty, her youth, her once-innocence. He needed answers and this was the only way he believed that he would get them, trust be damned. He didn't wait to see where she was going because he already knew. He started the Buick and pulled away from the curb, making a u-turn in the quiet street before leaving her there. He drove around aimlessly before parking up from the bar entrance and killing his engine and lights. Then he sat and waited. It took less than an hour but Sansa emerged with the big soldier. His face looked young, perhaps twenty-one, but hard: he had small eyes, thin lips and sandy, close-cropped hair and he had his beefy hand wrapped around the girl's upper arm in a crushing grip. He steered her to his car and slapped her on the ass as she climbed in. He saw the brief flame of a lighter behind the windshield as Sansa lit herself a cigarette. The Marine walked around to the driver's side and got in; then the Ford drove off.

Sandor followed at a distance. The Ford turned up a road into the hills and so Sandor navigated the winding, unlit road until it ended suddenly onto a flat open area with a lighted sign:

HILLCREST MOTEL AND COTTAGES

And beneath it:

Nightly Rates

The neon 'S' in 'rates' flickered and buzzed irritatingly as he walked slowly around the grounds. There were two cars parked at the main building where a lighted lamp could be seen burning in an office window. As he walked by the rooms, he could hear laughter and glasses clinking; a radio playing Johnny Mercer. Not Sansa's laugh. Not Sansa.

He walked instead towards the single cottages. The soldier's tan Ford was parked almost out of sight next to the furthest cottage. His heart sank and his guts twisted with rage, knowing what he would find if he were to kick the door in with his badge and gun. But fucking in motels was not a crime; not for consenting adults. Sandor gritted his teeth and clenched his fists. He had the fucking Marine's license number: he could trace him easily. But he wouldn't know what he was doing with Sansa. He shouldn't want to know, he told himself. He should turn around and get in his car and go home and forget bloody Sansa Stark or bloody Alayne Stone forever. What was she to him now? She had asked him the same question herself. But he couldn't help himself. He couldn't stop himself from wanting to help her, any more than he could stop himself from wanting her.

He walked wide around the little cabin, angling towards a side window. The sound of bedsprings creaking grew louder with every careful step he took. Up here in the hills, they hadn't bothered to lower the blinds or shut the window. Steeling himself and taking a deep breath, he cautiously leaned his head to look inside.

All the lights were on. Sansa was on top of the bed, with her dark hair fanned out beneath her and her pale, thin arms akimbo over her head. She was naked but for a black garter and seamed stockings and her long legs were over the shoulders of the big soldier. She still had those ankle-strap shoes on. On the night stand was a bottle and two glasses and a radio that took nickels and dimes; but there was no music, no accompaniment to the sordid scene. Next to a chair heaped with discarded clothing, a cigarette burned down in an ashtray.

The big man was buck naked: hugely muscled, beefy all over with a highly defined body that would turn to fat before middle age. Sandor could see several tattoos on his arms and another on his buttocks. He had one foot on the floor and one knee on the bed and was pumping Sansa vigorously and grunting like a pig. Sweat was beading on his forehead and dripping at his temples. His big square hands were digging into her thighs as he used his merciless grip on her for leverage to fuck her. His thin-lipped mouth was a lustful sneer.

"My poor little rich girl," he called her between clenched teeth, "all hot and wet, huh?" he crowed. "I'll fuck you so hard you can't walk straight…and you'll love it, won't you?"

"Yes, Tor," she answered breathily.

Sandor took in the sight of her flushed face and her taut, pointed nipples and knew she wasn't lying.

"Who else are you fucking, huh? I saw him drop you off. A new Buick. Who was he, huh?" He reached up and slapped her face. "Who?"

She winced faintly but looked up at the soldier. "There's only you, Tor," she sighed now.

His fist drove into her side, even as he kept pumping her. Sansa gasped in pain.

"Lying bitch," he hissed. "Always lying...about men, about money…" He slapped her across the face again and then backhanded her. "Why do you always gotta make me so mad, huh? Why?" Sansa's head jerked each time he struck her but she kept her arms over her head and never blocked his blows. Instead she arched her back and neck, offering herself up for more.

"Harder, Tor," she moaned, "just like you like it."

"No," he pulled out abruptly and climbed over her clumsily and straddled her slim torso. He leaned to lick between her breasts and then placed his big, flabby pink dick between them and squeezed together hard. "A rich girl like you should have a pearl necklace," he laughed cruelly. He bucked his hips roughly, sliding his cock between her breasts and grunting. "Barbara Hutton got her rich daddy's money, so why don't you?"

"My brothers, Tor-"

"You're Sansa _fucking _Stark," he hissed angrily. "You need to get that money…for _us_, baby. Haven't I been good of you, huh? You need to find a way; then we'll be set." He grunted again. "Ugh, ugh, yesssss! You _love_ it!" He crowed like a fucking barnyard cock again as he came all over her throat and neck in jerky spurts.

Outside the window, Sandor tasted bile and stopped himself from puking, but he couldn't tear his eyes away.

The man grabbed Sansa's hair on top of her head in a closed fist and jerked hard. Then he leaned his face close to hers. "If anyone else finds you and knows who you are," he threatened as he traced a fat finger through his cum and across her throat, "I don't have to tell you that next time…this could be a fucking noose around your neck, you little bitch."

"Yes, Tor."

"No more lies. No more stalling. No more fucking around."

"Yes, Tor."

He slapped her thigh and smiled smugly: a hard, ugly grin.

"Now pour me a drink."

"Yes, Tor."

….

_Pour me a drink._

Every time Sandor heard those words in his head again he drank to try to blot it out. He was halfway through the scotch he had brought home and pushed to the back of a cabinet. He held the bottle unsteadily over the glass and sloppily poured out another shot. Moonlight slanted in through the open blinds and across the darkened rooms of his apartment but he did not see it, nor would he have cared. He'd seen and heard enough for one night, may be for the rest of his fucking life.

The big Marine had something on Sansa and he was using it to blackmail her; he was using it to use her. And it was something that he believed would get her the noose. _Murder._ That was the only crime a woman would hang for in this and almost any other state. He wanted her money, wanted her to make her family pay her to stay hidden so there would be no arrest, no trial and no scandal.

Sandor slammed his fist onto the table. He couldn't have said which tormented him worse: thinking Sansa had committed murder and would blackmail her own family, or seeing Sansa with that goon. Even the drink could not stop him from being haunted and sickened by all he had witnessed.

Sansa with her head thrown back, gripping the shoulders of the big Marine, riding his cock harder than she'd rode her little mare. He'd dug his fingers into her hips and her soft ass as she had, leaving red marks and bruises on her white skin.

Sansa pouring his drinks, and her own: downing hard liquor with long swallows until she slurred and moved unsteadily, setting her feet down carefully in those damned shoes.

Sansa sitting naked on the edge of the bed or a chair, lighting her cigarettes and exhaling languidly between those full lips, or letting smoke spew forth as she laughed. She'd flicked ash into ashtrays and ground them out when she was done, or left them burning when she was being fucked.

Sansa bracing herself on the metal bedframe or the table or the big Marine as she was being fucked hard every which way with her dark hair over her face, her long legs spread, her breath coming in pants and moans and the name Tor on her red lips.

And in between all those fucks, the brute had pushed and slapped her, pinched her nipples, punched her stomach and even put his hands around her neck and throttled her until Sandor had put his hand on the holster of his gun, ready to burst in and stop him; but the soldier had stopped before Sansa choked. The big ape wasn't going to off his easy fuck and what he hoped would be easy money; not yet anyway.

Sansa… God, Sansa.

His guts churned sourly and he tasted the scotch that threatened to come up again. That bastard treated Sansa like dirt and had her begging for more. _Hit me, hurt me; harder, harder._ Christ, is that really how she liked it: the rougher the better? Her submissive obedience to the goon may have been from fear of whatever he was holding over her head but her obvious pleasure was not. He shut his eyes tight when he remembered the image of her flushed face and aroused body, her breathy cries and her gasps and shudders of release. He wiped his eyes and shook his head, trying in vain to obliterate all he had seen. Or maybe…just maybe it was all she knew; Christ knew he hadn't treated her so much better that he could possibly know for sure. He'd overlooked and ignored what he hadn't wanted to see because he'd wanted her.

_Fuck me. No girl; I'm not done with you. I'll fuck you like a stallion. Easy, girl: slow and easy. _

With an incoherent cry of rage, Sandor threw the empty glass across the room where it shattered against the wall.

….

"Sandor?"

Elder brother was pleased to see him though surprised. When he came closer and smelled the scotch and saw Sandor's bleary, bloodshot eyes he led him to his cramped office without a word.

"Poor child," he murmured now as Sandor sat with his head in his hands. "Whatever she's done, Sandor," he shook his head regretfully, "she is in danger with this man. He's hurt her body and soul, so that she does not even consider herself worthy of true love or tenderness. A girl who does not even want to see her own family, or want a family of her own?" He tutted and shook his head sadly.

"I've tried talking to her," he rasped, though he knew he had not tried hard enough. She distracted him too easily and he had let himself be distracted. Remembering her coy looks and submissive sexual offerings, he wondered if that had not been her intention all along; he also felt like shit for suspecting her.

"Of course you have tried, Sandor: you understand," the man said simply.

Sandor looked up at him now.

"You know what it is to be the one who lived. You lost your parents and your sister; this girl has lost most of her family, and a boy who may have loved her. The guilt eats away at you: why should you have anything when they have nothing, not even their lives?" he questioned rhetorically. "It is likely that she cannot face her remaining family because she cannot justify even to herself how she is still alive when the others are not. And if she did anything nefarious or criminal to survive…that would only make it worse for her; and it could bring shame and unwanted attention to a well-known family, and to the businesses."

"And if she did kill someone?" Sandor put the troubling question to him.

The chaplain sighed unhappily. "She is how old? Seventeen, you think?"

"About that," Sandor replied flatly.

"Possibly any killing on her part could have been self-defense; or it may have been an accident. But a troubled and threatened girl from a good family, on her own in the world… it's difficult to say if that would garner sympathy or resentment. The scandal sheets will certainly make the most of it. Her mother's uncle will likely afford her a good defense counsel, would he not?" he questioned Sandor.

"Maybe I should find her a way out of the country…" Sandor thought out loud.

The chaplain made no comment.

" …but I swore to uphold the law," Sandor continued, hoping for guidance.

"You did; but as Dickens wrote: _the law is an _ass, or at least it can be." He paused and placed his hands together under his chin and studied Sandor thoughtfully.

"So she is the Sansa you called for in your pain. Are you certain that you should be the one to try to help her, Sandor? Are you sure you can cope with the…the pressure? I'm pleased that you came to me today instead of walking into the ocean again, Sandor; but what about the next time? Should you really be risking your health, maybe your life for this girl? You're not the only policem-"

"I am the only one: the only one who knows her. I've failed her once and now… Besides, it's him too," he rasped. "Didn't I say I wanted to get the ones who hurt people?"

"You did," he acknowledged shortly and, having accepted Sandor's decision, he did not question him again. "Haven't you any way to find out what happened to the girl first, Sandor? You must have the means at your disposal in the police department. Might be there's no need for her to run off or fear for her life. And if this soldier should lose whatever hold he has over her, well, then she may want to return to her family. At the very least, she will be free of him and his…manipulative attentions."

"Or might be he'll just kill her," Sandor rasped darkly.


	6. Chapter 6

"Coffee, black?" she asked when she saw him sit down at the counter. She was working early mornings to mid-afternoon this week.

He nodded wearily.

"Some lunch? Pie?" she chirped. "There's banana cream or lemon meringue."

"You choose," he managed a twitch of a smile for her.

She set the coffee and a slice of lemon meringue pie in front of him. "Please don't over-tip me this time," she berated him with a teasing smile.

"'Pretty girl needs rent money'," he reminded her though he did not smile this time. It irked him that she was chipper when he knew she was covered in bruises and likely still sore from...He drank his coffee instead of finishing his thoughts. Maybe the girl just put on a smiling face for customers.

She blinked deep blue eyes at him now.

"We need to talk," he told her levelly.

"You always say that…and then we don't," she replied coyly.

"I'll take what comes," he deadpanned, and she huffed a short laugh.

"Alright," she murmured quietly.

"Order up, Alayne!" the short-order cook called from the kitchen.

Sansa rushed to the kitchen and then came back out carrying two plates of the daily special: a hot chicken sandwich with gravy and peas. He watched her work for a time: smile and nod, smile and nod; serve and clear. He felt oddly numb to look at her now. No elation in his heart or throbbing of his cock; just a weary sadness for a broken girl. He felt ancient, and very, very tired. He left a quarter tip.

He showered and changed and picked her up at the boardinghouse that evening. The old foreign landlady was glad to see him and invited him to wait in the tiny parlor which was decorated, that is to say cluttered, with lace doilies and china figurines. The sofa and chairs were worn, the carpet threadbare. She kept it spotless; he'd give her that, though he suspected Sansa had a hand in it as well. She had been a fastidious girl: he remembered she always folded her towel by the by pool when she left it for the help; and he had heard from the other staff that she had been so mortified when she got her first period and stained the bed sheets that she had tried to hide them. She had worn white gloves and a straw hat with a blue ribbon to church on Sundays. He wondered vaguely if she still bothered with church now; she seemed to have little reason to be grateful. What would Alayne Stone pray for?

"Ah! See how pretty she is," the landlady exclaimed softly.

Sansa descended the creaky steps in a lavender dress with tiny black polka dots and lace trim around the collar. She wore flat shoes, like a ballerina's, and a pearly clip in one side of her dark hair; the other side fell in waves over her shoulder. Her lips were pink, her eyelids were dusted a pale lilac color. She almost looked like the girl she was, or had been. Sandor sighed and twitched a smile.

"Nice of you to get yourself dolled up, girl," he looked her over appreciatively in the Buick.

She smoothed the skirt of her dress. "It's second-hand," she observed modesty, "the shoes too. I need to buy everything that way now. Los Angeles is full of used and consignment shops: old costumes and wardrobe from the studios or nightclubs, worn party frocks…though of course I haven't use for anything that fancy. Pretty things have a short life in this town," she remarked, "people use them up and pass them on or they throw them out." Sandor wondered if she were speaking of herself as well.

"I hope you like Chinese food," he rasped instead.

The place was done in red and black lacquer with paper dragons and lanterns and it was fairly crowded with couples and families, whites and Chinese. Their hostess brought tea and left them menus. Sandor thought to order himself a drink but did not; the girl did not ask for one.

"Shall I pour?" Sansa asked, placing her slender hand on the handle of the teapot. He looked at her now. She seemed relaxed and almost eager. He wondered when was the last time she dined out anywhere, other than Sunnyside Coffee & Luncheon.

When he nodded she poured their tea daintily and raised her tiny cup to his.

"Sunny days?" she teased.

"And sweet nights," he rasped ironically and tapped her cup. Of course he hoped she would never know what he had learned about her nights. He ordered for both of them: sweet and sour soup, stir-fried beef with scallions and ginger, chicken fried rice with cashews and crispy pork with noodles. They ate dim-sum style, serving themselves from the china plates into small bowls circled with Chinese characters and eating with chopsticks. Sansa surprised him with her deftness and then remembered she had lived near San Francisco and thought that old man Stark must have taken his family into Chinatown more than once; but he could not bring himself to ask.

For dessert, they were served green tea ice cream, which delighted Sansa, and fortune cookies. Sandor cracked his with his big hands and the cookie crumbled into dust.

"_Everything you have in life, you must earn…_and here I thought I was working for the fun of it. Your turn," he told her.

She cracked her cookie open gently and placed the shards on her side plate. She looked at it and the smile vanished from her face. Sandor reached over and took it from her.

"_A man can never be truly rich without family,"_ he read. "They should call them cliché cookies," he grumbled. "Chin up, girl: you're not a man, anyways."

She nodded absently. That vacant sadness was back. "More tea?" she asked as she raised the pot, but she knocked over her cup and it spilled over the tablecloth. "Oh! I'm sorry." Her voice was thick with near tears. "I've ruined dinner!"

Sandor looked at her now across the table: her cynicism gone and her vulnerability raw and painful even to his jaded eyes. He wanted nothing so much as to take her in his arms; instead he took the teapot from her and set if down. He put his hand over hers and leaned closer. "You haven't ruined anything, little bird. Go dry your eyes and wait for me by the door."

After paying their bill, he found her outside. She was staring curiously at the restaurant sign: THE THREE DRAGONS it read and had the heads of a black, a white and a green dragon. Sandor came to stand beside her and looked at it as well.

"What is it, girl?"

Her brow was furrowed but she shrugged. "Nothing, I guess." But she looked back at it over her shoulder as they walked away.

"Do you want a drink?" he asked when they walked into his apartment. As soon as he said it, he realized he had nothing to drink. Elder brother had advised him to toss whatever he had left from his last bout of drinking and he had.

She hesitated. "No, thank you," she murmured. She still looked sad. "You said we needed to talk."

Everything he knew about her suddenly no longer mattered: he only felt that overwhelming urge to keep her safe, and to have her. Despite what he had seen, he still wanted her.

He drew her into his arms and looked down at her. "…and then we don't."

"…and then we don't," she repeated breathily.

He bent to kiss her gently: once, twice and then he held her tighter and kissed her deeply. He heard her sigh and felt her reach her arms around his neck. He gathered her hair up in his hand and cradled the back of her head as he deepened the kiss even further, drawing her breath into his body until she whimpered softly. He pulled away and buried his face in her neck and hair.

"Sansa," he rasped low.

"Yes, Sandor," she sighed.

He led her to the bedroom where he lowered the blind and pulled down the bedding before turning back to her. He wanted her in his bed, like a real lover. She had bent her head to unbutton her dress but he stilled her hands.

"Let me," he told her. He unbuttoned her dress and pushed it off her shoulders and draped it over the chair. He lowered the straps of her slip and eased it down her body so that it fluttered to the floor. He caught it and tossed it onto her dress. He let her unhook her garter and roll down her stockings, and then lifted her onto the bed. He hastily stripped himself: tie, shirt, suspenders and trousers, socks and shoes and skivvies. She sat on the bed in the darkened room and watched him until he climbed on the bed to join her.

He just looked at her at first; then reached out gently to stroke her hair from her forehead and brush his fingertips across her cheekbones and down her jaw and over her lips. He took her face in his hands and leaned in to kiss her forehead, her eyes, her nose, cheeks and lips, She giggled nervously and then settled. He ran his fingertips down her neck. "Lie back, Sansa."

She complied but her eyes watched him warily. She reached up to grasp the bedframe, as though to brace herself but he ignored it and began to kiss her neck and ears and collarbone. His hands began to caress her gently, just skimming over the skin of her throat and her breasts. He started kissing his way down her body and between her breasts and then underneath them and over until he brushed her nipples with his lips and kissed them gently. Ignoring her bruises, he kissed her taut belly and smooth hips and soft thighs, making circles with his fingertips as he descended her body. He kissed behind her knees, her calves and finally even the soles of her feet. He turned her over slowly and kissed her sweet round behind and up the length of her spine, feeling all the little bumps and ridges with light, grazing fingertips. He kissed behind her neck, under her hair and then turned her over again. He heard her sniffle softly and saw in the darkness that she has tears running from her eyes down into her hair and ears. Her lips trembled and so he kissed them again and again, shushing her between kisses with soft murmurs.

"It's alright, Sansa. You're alright."

She reached shaking arms around him and he settled onto her and kept caressing her until he reached between her legs and found that hard little knot of flesh and rubbed it gently with his thumb. She gasped softly and her legs fell open and when his fingers found her wetness, he eased his cock in, slowly and gently, and he felt her quiver and stifle a sob.

"It's alright," he whispered to her again. He wrapped her legs and arms around him and gathered her in his arms and rocked gently, moving slowly in and out of her with deliberate patience. He churned his hips and swayed against her, making her feel all of him and letting him feel all of her. Her arm clutched his back and she raised her head to kiss his neck and shoulders and rub her lips on his skin. She breathed on him and breathed him in. She rubbed her thighs over his hips and lower back and legs and reached her hand up into his hair caressingly. Finally she rubbed her soft cheek against his scarred face and turned to kiss it reverently and sweetly. She lay her head back on the pillow now and still he saw her tears stream silently from her eyes and heard and felt the soft hiccups of sobs in her breathing.

She rocked her body with his now, churning her hips and flaring her thighs to take him in deeper and to tighten herself around him with each slow gentle thrust. Her little sobbing breath hitched suddenly and she arched herself against him, her body strained tight and her full mouth open with a silent cry. He felt the tightening and fluttering of her insides that meant her release and still he moved over and inside her until he could not hold back any longer. He pulled back and raised himself on his hands, rearing over her and as he gave long, deep slow thrusts into her warmth until finally he groaned and came with a flood of warmth through is entire body that shook him to his core.

Breathlessly, he lowered himself onto her again and held her tightly to him. She clutched at him like a child and so he rained kisses on her face and mouth in the dark that she returned eagerly and breathlessly. He caressed her hair and pulled her to him as he rolled off her and onto his side.

"Can you stay awhile?" he rasped.

She didn't answer; she just curled up to him with a soft hand on his chest and hummed quietly. She fell asleep soon after, he could tell by her gentle, steady breathing. Sandor could feel his own heart beating beneath her slender hand and so placed his own large hand over it and stared at the ceiling. He had never slept well: it was one of the reasons he had drank so much, and it was worse since the war. But lying now in his own bed with Sansa curled up next to him, he was as relaxed and contented as he could remember feeling since he was a boy.

How many happy years had he had, he wondered, before his older brother Gregor had turned his anger and brutality on him? Maybe he'd always done it but Sandor had been too young to know. Certainly his sister had begun to protect him and keep them apart before he realized his brother's true nature, before he realized that Gregor already tormented their sister when their father was not around. Eventually he would leave Sandor horribly scarred and take everything he loved, including his sister and father and leaving him alone in the world to make his own way or die. He didn't remember his mother. There were only a few sepia-toned photographs of a pretty woman, one of her next to their dark father on their wedding day. "Injuns" some of the kids at school had called them though their father, a surly man and deputy sheriff, said that they were not, just dark; and they had grey eyes, not black. Still, Sandor tried not to get too burned by the sun, but it was not easy in the southwest for a boy who liked to play outdoors. He wanted to be a cowboy and ride horses and live in tents and cook over open fires. Gregor had a toy horse with moving legs and head: you could make it look like it was galloping or just standing in a pasture, grazing. His brother never played with it anymore; Gregor even worked as a hand at a nearby ranch because he was so big and strong for his age. He could rope and hold down the baby calves as they were being branded. He wanted to be tough like the ranch hands, but Sandor could not help flinching when the baby cows were being burned; Gregor would breathe deep and smile whenever the red-hot branding iron would sizzle into a calf's rump.

One, afternoon, Sandor took the toy horse to play out behind their bungalow, making it gallop and jump fences he had built out of twigs and stones while he made whinnying noises. He never even heard Gregor come into the backyard and by the time he had Sandor by the scruff of the neck it was too late to run. He probably would not have gotten far anyway, but he would not have been so close to the smoldering pile left in the neighbours' yard after they'd burned their trash. Gregor had stomped right over with Sandor under his arm like a bedroll and-

He sat up with a start, waking the girl beside him.

"Hm?" she murmured. "Sandor?"

He realized he was breathing hard. He patted her reassuringly but she sat up next to him.

"Are you alright?" she asked, reaching to stroke gentle fingers over his burn scars.

He took her hand now and kissed her fingers reverently and with gratitude. She was still the only woman, besides his own sister and some kinder nurses, who had touched his face.

"Yes, little bird; I'm alright," he rasped quietly.

She smiled sadly in the dimness. "No matter how hard we try not to look back, it still comes to us in our dreams, doesn't it?"

She was trying to be sympathetic, but his past and his secrets could make him just as distant and hardened as she could be.

"Better our past comes back to haunt us in our dreams than in real life, girl," he could not help saying.

She drew her hand away now. "Yes," she replied absently. She turned her head to the window. The first light of dawn could be seen around the edges of the blind. "I- I work early today-" she began.

"Get dressed. I'll take you home."


	7. Chapter 7

Tormund, Karl, PFC. USMC

The file sat on his desk, one of two files that were hidden under the big green blotter until everyone had cleared off for lunch. One file was of a report from Hawaii; the other…well, he'd had to use his connections to get the soldier's file: the Marine Corp didn't like handing over information on one of their own without good reason. Sandor understood: _Semper Fi._ Bracing himself with a deep breath now, he flipped open the file folder with a pen.

"Son of a bitch," he snarled as he finished reading.

He pulled out the second file now.

….

He had to wait before she would meet with him again. When he stopped in at Sunnyside's, she had almost blushed to see him and dropped her eyes from his gaze frequently. No, she could not get away; she was working nights and her landlady had twisted her ankle on the front steps of the rickety porch. She was no longer coy with him but she was more reserved now, a strange sort of regretful distance. He had hoped his tenderness would have made her trust him more, but it seemed to have unnerved her instead; or maybe it had been his abruptness when he took her home afterward. But he had to reach her, and soon too: before the Marine came back for…more.

Finally, he simply showed up at the boardinghouse on a cloudy afternoon. She was taking down the laundry from the clothesline for the landlady and folding it neatly into a basket: sheets and towels mostly, but he spotted the silky, pale slip he had stripped off her lovely body that night.

_Steady, Clegane._

"It's important," he rasped firmly.

Her eyes darted about skittishly, like a trapped animal, and she put one arm across her torso and rubbed her neck. Finally, she nodded.

He drove her out to the beach again. This time there was no picnic lunch, and there would be no leisurely walk in the sun, though he noticed now that she was wearing the same yellow checked dress she had worn the last time. The day was overcast and the wind coming off the ocean was cold. The long stretch of sand was nearly deserted but for an old man walking in the distance. The sky was full of screeching seagulls.

Sansa hugged herself and rubbed her arms.

"Why have we come here?" she asked as she looked out to sea. The clouds on the horizon were dark grey and moving in fast.

He gazed down at her sternly. "So you can't make any more excuses or offer any more distractions or run away from me, Sansa," he let his eyes bore into hers. "You need to tell me everything. Everything that's happened from the night you got away from Baelish-"

She turned her head abruptly, away from him and back to the sea. "No."

He took her by the arm to try to turn her back. "This isn't a game anymore, girl. Either you come clean, or I lock you up: I'll arrest you for jaywalking or littering if I have to and I'll book you as Sansa Stark, not Alayne Stone."

"You _can't_," she cried suddenly, panic her voice. "Please…Sandor: you wouldn't; would you?"

Those big blue eyes were looking up at him pleadingly, helplessly. He wanted to protect her, but to do that he needed to know the truth. He would have to be hard on her; he could not let her play him.

"I will if I have to," he replied firmly.

She shook her head. "Please," she begged. "I can't look back. It- it hurts so much. A-all I can see is everything I have lost," she said dully.

When his face showed no signs of relenting, she shut her eyes tightly and took a deep quavering breath.

"I- I don't remember much of that night," she began in a flat and distant voice and Sandor knew she was choosing her words carefully. "I was lying on the dirt floor of the shed; I didn't know how long I had been there anymore. It was hot and dark and- and it hurt to move. I was so thirsty. I- I even thought I might die…I thought I was dying, because I heard someone calling my name; at first I thought it was my father…" She pressed her fingertips to her mouth to stifle a sob then. When she pulled them away, she almost smiled tenderly. "But it was Harry," she breathed his name like a soft prayer. "He- he had come looking for me…but I was so weak and I had no voice to call to him so- so I felt around me for something, anything to make a sound. I must have knocked something over, or hit something because he came closer and called again. I do remember the sound of the door of the shed squeaking open," she closed her eyes and raised her chin now and let the breeze blow on her face. "I felt the cool night air rush in, and Harry's voice came closer. I felt him try to lift me from the ground; it hurt so much but I wanted to tell him it was alright, that it wasn't his fault."

"What about Baelish?" Sandor asked quietly.

Sansa shook her head. "I- I don't know," she replied haltingly.

Sandor's eyes narrowed. "I think you do," he rasped. There was a distant rumble of thunder now.

"No! No, I don't remember anything after that. Harry took me to a family he knew: they were Hawaiian and so he thought no one would look for me there. They were very kind. Harry's father was a minister, you see, and he had taught young men in a seminary on Hawaii before Harry was born; this man, Harry's friend, was a minister and had been one of his father's students…" she trailed off then.

Sandor spoke now: "Petyr Baelish was murdered. He was shot dead and his house was torn apart…by someone looking for something."

Sansa shuddered when it thundered again and then finally answered. "I know," she said quietly, and turned to him then. "But I did not know it then," she told him earnestly. "When Harry told me to use his mother's name, I thought he feared Petyr would come looking for me, Petyr or…Mr P-payne," she could barely get his name past her lips. "I didn't know the police were looking for me; not even when the Hawaiian woman helped me to dye my hair. It was the minister who arranged my passage and even took me to the ship: Harry had already sailed off to war by then. Surely a minister wouldn't have-"

"Wouldn't have what?"

Sansa's brow furrowed in reflection. "Surely…surely he would not have helped Harry and I if- if he thought he had done something wrong," she concluded. But she looked up at him searchingly.

Sandor thought a moment. The girl was likely right but then how did she know about Baelish, and why was she still hiding?

"I read about Petyr's death on the ship; it was still in the newspapers," she continued before he could ask her. "That's how I knew they were looking for me. It said at first that they thought I was abducted…because…because I was young and- and wealthy. They had no recent photograph; I realized I had not had my picture taken in so long. They printed the one taken the day we landed: the one of me with father and Arya…I- I hardly recognized myself anymore. I wondered if my own family would even know me," she spoke wistfully, "but of course, they were gone." She was staring out at sea again. The sky was covered in clouds now, some of them were black.

"So you had nothing to do with it, then; what about your Harry?"

She continued staring but he saw her lips tremble.

"Sansa?"

She shook her head now. "I never thought it possible of him, but-"

Sandor was losing his patience and it was taking all his self-control not to tell her what he'd discovered. He needed to hear it from her if he was going to help her.

"But what, girl? What made you think it _could _be possible? Did he tell you he did it?"

She shook her head vigorously. "No. I didn't even know Petyr was- was dead when Harry left."

"Did someone else tell you he did it?"

She hesitated before nodding. "Yes," she barely whispered.

"Who told you this, Sansa?"

"A-" her voice cracked and she raised her hand and bit her knuckle and took a quavering breath before continuing. "A Marine in his company told me. He told me that Harry had asked him to find me and- and to help me...because I would be in trouble if they found me. H-he told me that…that it was all because of me really: that Harry had loved me so much and that he went wild to think something had happened to me and then when he saw me…when he found me…he couldn't control himself. He said that made me an accessory to murder, and that my running away and hiding only made me look guilty. He- he promised to help me…for Harry." Her mouth quirked into a weak smile, "He said Harry had saved his life, and so he would help me no matter what it cost him."

"How noble," Sandor could not keep the sneer out of his voice. "Who was this Marine?"

Sansa tilted he head now. She seemed suddenly more alert and guarded.

"Why? She asked now. "What does it matter?"

Sandor squeezed her arm and turned her to face him. "Who. Was. He?" he demanded.

"He _helped_ me. I can never see my family again because of what happened. He's my only friend."

He jerked her arm hard and put his face into hers angrily.

"You friend?" Sandor was incredulous and disgusted. "I should have beat sense into you years ago, girl," he raged. "I should have fucking dragged you away with me the night I left! You stupid little bird, too stupid to know even _how_ stupid you are!"

"Stop it," Sansa pleaded, "stop saying such things. You don't understand-"

"No, _you_ don't understand," he looked with helpless anger at her, at the Marine, at himself and at the injustice of the whole fucking world that would allow harm to come to a girl like her. "He _lied_!"

She stopped stock still and stared at him then. The strong wind blew her hair across her face but she did not reach to push it away. Sandor began to wonder if she had even heard him. The sound of the waves had gotten louder.

"He _lied_ to you, girl. Harry never killed Baelish. This soldier, this Marine: he never knew Harry, never served in the same company, never fought on Iwo Jima. It's all been lies to control you, to have you," he explained.

"No," she breathed and tried to back away from him. She finally pushed the dark hair off her face. "No. It can't be true. _You're_ lying. You want me for yourself. I _never_ should have trusted you. You're _awful," _she hissed now. "You don't know him; you don't know anything-"

"Look at me. _Look at me_!I know Baelish was killed with a shotgun, a hunting rifle; the same kind they kept at the estate: the _Lannister_ estate,' he let the name sink in with her, "and not some soldier's sidearm. I read the report. The police on Hawaii may not have known, but even after all these years I recognize Payne's handiwork. _He_ killed Baelish; and he probably meant to kill you as well and make it look like a botched robbery, so that you could never go to the police and testify against him. They might have looked more closely at your father's death if you had. Baelish was bloody careless to have had him beat you so badly and let you live. Well, he paid for that: Payne was cleaning up his own mess," Sandor told her, "but you slipped the net. Your Harry must have already taken you away when Payne got there; you're lucky he never found you. Payne fled the island that same week without a word or leaving a clue as to where he went. He could be anywhere now."

Sansa shook her head weakly, barely a twitch of her slender neck; but he could see her body trembling. He let go of her arm and reached to put both hands on her shoulders now.

"It wasn't your fault, girl," he tried to explain again.

"No!" She shouted suddenly and broke from him. She started to run down the beach away from him but Sandor caught her easily. She struggled to free herself.

"No! No, let me go," she cried. "You're lying! He said he cared for me because of Harry; he said any man would kill for me, himself included. He said he would look after me. Why? Why would he tell me such things if they weren't true? Why?"

"Because you're _Sansa fucking Stark_," Sandor growled. "Because you're rich. Because you're young and you're so fucking beautiful, Sansa..." he held her tighter now, and pushed his face into her hair. "Because any man alive _would_ kill for you, and die for you, and die from wanting you." He took a deep breath of her skin now.

"NO!" She wrenched herself free. "I don't want any man to want me! I don't want you!" She looked around helplessly. "I want to die! Oh God, just let me die, please," she sobbed.

She took off running again, straight towards the ocean. The air resounded with a deafening 'crack' as lightning streaked across the darkened sky. For a second, Sandor lost sight of her but he saw her in the water, splashing as she ran over waves and then slowing as she reached deeper water and her dress got wet and stuck to her. He bolted after her, sloshing through the surf in his laced leather shoes until he reached her and grabbed her hair and dress and pulled her back to him. She lost her balance and so he was able to lift her in his arms and carry her back to shore and set her down.

She was sobbing openly now, and pushing him away as he removed his jacket and draped it around her shoulders. Though he was panting from exertion, Sandor picked her up again and carried her to his parked car. His lungs were burning and he almost slipped and dropped her. The rain had started falling and was pelting them heavily and soaking them. He set her down and pushed her into the driver's side of the Buick and over to the passenger seat as he climbed in after her.

The rain was lashing against the car windows now, drumming onto the roof and making it impossible to see. Sandor doubted it would be safe to drive but he was afraid the girl would bolt again if they stayed.

He turned to her now. Her hair was a wet mess and she was clutching the collar of his jacket around her neck. He could see the skin on her thighs through the wet skirt of her dress as it clung to her. There was sand on her legs and her bare feet and he realized that she must have lost her shoes on the beach or in the ocean. She was sitting stock still and staring vacantly again: her passionate outburst seemed to have drained her. He hoped she was calmer now, that he could talk to her and reach her, for her own sake.

"Sansa?"

Her lips seemed to try to form words but none came out.

"Girl?"

"Tor," she whispered finally.


	8. Chapter 8

_Tor?_

Sandor could not believe what he had heard. Shattered and disillusioned by a horrible lie the Marine had used to ruin and control her, and the girl calls for _him_. Sandor thought to throttle her himself now. He realized he was nowhere near reaching her; he wondered if he even could help her now if she was so much under his spell. Bloody stupid little bird, he thought again.

"You mean Karl Tormund?" he rasped harshly. "The man who lied to you-"

"How do you know that?" She turned to look at him suspiciously. "How do you know _him_?"

Sandor hesitated, wondering how much he should tell her. The rain kept beating down on the roof of the Buick. Somehow he sensed that if she knew he had seen her in that motel cottage, at her lowest and worst, that she would never trust him; she would likely refuse to ever see him again.

"I saw you with him…outside the boardinghouse," he told her, "and I was concerned. He seemed to treat you…he seemed rough and pushy. I ran his license plate number; got his file from the Corp. It ain't pretty, girl."

She blinked. "Tor's had a hard life," she insisted. "He can't help the way he is. Surely _you_ understand that?"

He smarted at the comparison. "That don't mean he can take it out on you, girl; and I don't lie about what I am," he retorted.

"He's taken nothing out on me; he's helped me…for Harry…and for me."

"Look at me, girl. He never knew your Harry. Private Harold Harding was killed on Iwo Jima; Private Karl Tormund wasn't in the same company, he never went to Iwo Jima. Harry never saved his life and he never _fucking_ knew him."

But Sansa shook her head stubbornly. "That's impossible," she insisted. "He knew all about him, he knew about me…who I was-"

"He stole his letters," he told her bluntly. "Harry's letters…off another Marine on Pavuvu after your Harry was killed; the other boy was going to send them to his parents. Your…_friend_ went into other soldier's tents and went through their things. This Tormund did a lot of time in the stockade for fighting; so what, lots of guys got into fights but these fights started because other soldiers believed he stole from them. He was reprimanded for dealing in contraband: Jap skulls, gold teeth, things that gave our boys a bad name; after '44 it was banned outright. He stole from everyone: dead Japs, other Marines, girl, even dead ones: might be they never proved it but your Harry's friends were certain it was him. It's in his file. All of it. He's rotten and crooked, and he'll do anything for a buck. _Semper fi,_" Sandor sneered now, "only one Karl Tormund is faithful to is his own bloody self."

Sansa shuddered again and drew his wet jacket tighter around her throat.

"He has family, back in Minnesota. They lost their farm…he'd do anything to help them," she tried to explain.

"Karl Tormund was raised in an orphanage in St. Paul's: mother dead, father unknown. Ran away at 14. No family. It's in his service record: no one to notify in case of death, no one and no place to send his effects if he were killed in action. He's a hustler, a two-bit player and he's been playing you, girl…gave you some fucking sob story and you fell for it; because he told you it was all for Harry."

Sansa turned away again, hunching further down in the oversized jacket. She was trembling, from shock or cold Sandor was not sure. But it was still raining hard. Water poured down the outside the passenger window but she didn't seem to notice.

"Why?" she said finally. Why would he lie to me?"

Sandor barked a harsh laugh that made her shrink further from him. "Somehow he knew from those letters that you were Sansa Stark, or at least a troubled girl in hiding: an easy mark. You say he helped you but he let you believe you were wanted for murder or were party to it. And here you are living in a boardinghouse and working in a coffee shop; obviously he can't support you or doesn't mean to. Did he never try to get money from you? To make you try to claim your trust fund, any of it, for him?"

He saw her bite her lip, a certain sign of evasion and worry; he had not been interrogating suspects all this time without learning to watch for signs. When she did not answer him, he reached over and grabbed her by her chin and turned her face to look at him again. "And tell me he never fucked you, girl; I've seen the way he laid hands on you," he growled dangerously.

"He- he wanted to comfort me. He said I looked so sad and lost, and he said I was beautiful, so beautiful that he couldn't help himself-"

Sandor saw red and couldn't help gripping her chin even harder. "Couldn't _help_ himself? Are you saying he _forced _you?"

"No," Sansa insisted vaguely, "not really. I was young, I didn't understand it all: he said it would be alright, that he wouldn't leave me because I let him- He said it was normal for girls to resist, even when they wanted to; he told me I really wanted to…or else I would not have driven off with him in his car…" her brow furrowed as she tried to explain. "I guess I gave him the wrong idea; and I didn't want to make him angry…"

Sandor was sickened: no wonder the girl was so bloody fucked up. He let go of her chin and passed his hand over his face. Christ, he needed a drink.

"Make him angry," he repeated dully. "This man hurts you?" He already knew the answer but he wanted to hear her say it.

"He- he doesn't mean to, really. He has a bad temper, that's all; he worries about me and gets scared for me that I'm out where someone might find me. You see, if I were caught, he'd be in trouble too now…for helping me."

"Bloody hell, girl: he uses you, lies to you and tells you it's your fault? How can you make excuses for him after what he's done to you?"

"Didn't you have me in your car, Sandor? Didn't you hit me when I tried your patience?" she challenged. "You say _you_ want to help me too; do you think I don't know the price of your protection? I always have."

He sucked in a deep breath. Was the girl right? Was he no better that this other man who had hurt and damaged her so badly that he had made her his creature: the slinky looks, the booze and cigarettes, the rough sex and beatings? No. He hadn't taken advantage of her, or corrupted her innocence. He would never do that to her. He didn't think he could do that to any woman, much less a girl like Sansa.

"I don't tell you everything that's happened to you is your fault, and I never would. I haven't forced you to do anything, have I? No, not even fuck me; or make you contact your own family who are looking for you. I haven't tried to change you, or get anything from you, have I?" he questioned tightly. "I've told you the truth; and I've never meant to hurt you. All I ever wanted from you, girl, was _you_."

Sansa was quiet for a long moment. He didn't know what else he could tell her to make her believe him: the Marine Tormund was no good, he was a liar and dangerous. Even if she didn't trust him; she had to stop trusting and seeing this Tor.

"The- the way we were…the last time," she ventured timidly as she looked down at her hands, "in your bed. That- that's how it's supposed to be, isn't it?" she asked softly. She turned and looked up at him, her eyes wide and vulnerable.

He couldn't help reaching out to her; he gently pushed some of her wet hair off her forehead and traced his finger down the side of her beautiful face.

"It can be like that," he told her though in truth he had never been so tender with a woman before; he never thought any would have let him. "It can be gentle, or…or not; it can be rough as long as you're not hurting each other," he struggled to explain what he meant when most of his own liaisons had been brief and impersonal. "But I'm no knight in shining armour, that's for bloody certain," he admitted. "Where there no others…besides this Tormund? What about your Harry?"

Sansa gasped slightly. "I was just fifteen_; _Harry was barely eighteen. He wanted to court me, not- He was a sweet young man: very gentlemanly," her voice broke and tears welled up in her eyes now. "How can I have ever thought that he- that he could murder someone?"

"No others then?" He knew he was out of line asking but he had to know. He told himself he had to know everything if he was going to help her.

She blushed deeply and turned away, bringing her arms up around her body as she did. "I- I- He- Tor would have to go away for long stretches…without any leave. I- I would get lonely, and frightened that he may not come back to me. I- I needed to know that- that there could be someone else…if I needed…" She shut her eyes tight and shook her head. "I hated myself for it. I felt so…dirty. I had to drink whisky to make myself…and they treated me like Tor did, so I thought that was what men wanted; that it was how it was supposed to be. I- I liked that they wanted me though," she confessed haltingly, "it made me feel stronger somehow. I felt like it was the only thing I had…"

"Your only power, you mean; or your only worth?"

She ducked her head. "I'm not certain really: are they different? Cersei Lannister always said I was stupid: that I had been given this great power over men and didn't even know how to use it. _A woman's only weapon_, she called it. She said men would use me, so I may as well learn to do the same to them, and get something out of it. She made it all sound so cold and grasping. I wanted it to be…different. Better, somehow. I – I wanted to be loved," she observed quietly. "Sometimes I think men wanting me had been my greatest curse: if Joffrey had not wanted me, my father would be alive. If Harry hadn't loved me then Petyr would not have been so cruel to me. And if Tor hadn't wanted me-"

"Joffrey and Petyr and this Tor really wanted you for your money, though being pretty didn't hurt; and that is not your doing, it's their fault and their doing: all of it. Don't you blame yourself, girl. I'll wager that Harry boy loved you, he was willing to wait for you to come of age and probably would have asked to marry you first." Sandor stoked her cheek again. "You deserve to be loved: you're everything sweet and good-"

"I'm _horrible_," she lashed out miserably. "I'm stupid: a complete fool; and- and _cheap_, on my God…I've ruined myself. How can I ever face my family ever again? I'm no good anymore; I'm no good to anyone," she lamented. She dropped her head in her hands.

Sandor tried to pull them away. "Don't be like that. You're still good. Yes, you are," he insisted when she shook her head. "You're good for me."

"You think I'm stupid too," she countered dully, "and you're right: too stupid to know _how _stupid I am."

"You're young," he replied gently. "You lost your family, and you were naïve and trusting and you fell in with the wrong people, the worst kind of people. You're not the first; and it's none of it your fault. You learned a lot: learned to get by on your own and not complain, learned to work and watch your money. You're strong: stronger than you know; and you're still good, girl: you help your landlady, and that night cook adores you-"

"Hodor?" She shook her head. "Hodor is…well…you see, Hodor doesn't like me that way, or any girl; he's just my friend," she stuttered awkwardly.

"I get your meaning, girl. Plenty of choice names for a man like that but he's your friend so that's all I need to call him," he rasped with finality. "Point is, girl: you're not ruined; there's plenty of people who'll think you're good."

"Like you?" she mocked. "You know the worst; how can you ever think I'm good? Would you still want me?"

Sandor sighed resignedly. "I'll always want you, girl, but-"

She glanced up at him and hesitated. "But- what?"

"I think you need to decide what _you_ want now. Especially now you've admitted I was a wait between trains: someone in case this Tormund didn't come back to you," he tried to keep the bitterness out of his voice.

Sans bit her lip and looked embarrassed, more so than when she confessed to having picked up men.

"I- I'm sorry, Sandor. I was so scared when I saw you again because you know who I am; and because you're a policeman now. But then I remembered you offered to take me away and keep me safe. I thought if you could have me…that would be enough for you, that you wouldn't turn me in."

He scoffed now. "Fuck you and leave you…like all the others," he jeered.

Sansa's brow furrowed. "There weren't _that_ many," she tried to reason though she was clearly hurt by his comment. "I'm sorry if I offended you, and used you in my own way…but I'm not sorry we found each other again, Sandor. You have been good to me, despite everything." She reached tentatively to touch his arm but pulled back, unsure of herself now. "I- I'd forgotten so much of myself, from back then; I tried so hard not to think about it. But with you, I could remember a little, and even remember what it was like to be Sansa again…a little."

"You can be Sansa again, girl; there's no reason you can't now. You're free of this man, but you're in danger from him too. He's not going to give up his little prize without a fight," he warned her. "You may have built a life here but now you have to leave to be safe; there's no other way. You best go back to your family now: they'll protect you-"

"No," she replied clearly, "I can't."

"You can't stay here: he'll find you and he'll hurt you," Sandor rasped firmly.

"I can't go to my family, I can't," she insisted. "He wants money, from my trust fund. If I go back to them, what do you think he'll do: leave me in peace? He'll come looking for me and threaten to tell my family about me. I couldn't bear it for them to know-"

"You think you're the first girl from a rich family to take up beneath her station? Get over yourself, girl. The Tyrell girl took those surf lessons with that native Hawaiian; she was seen in his arms after Joff's funeral. Your family might not be so tight-assed as you think."

"If he doesn't get money from me or them, he may go to those awful newspapers. My family…they've been through enough Sandor."

"A lot of what they have been through is losing you: their Sansa. Will you leave them without ever letting them know what became of you? That's cruel, girl," he admonished her.

Her face crumpled and she teared up again. "Do- do you really think so, Sandor? I only want to protect them from…from what I have become. I- I told you once that I could never be Sansa Stark again," she shook her head, "and I don't think I can."

"Alright, alright," he conceded, as much to make her stop crying. He winced involuntarily at the sound. "But you have to go away, at least until you're ready to face your real life again."

"B- but where shall I go? I won't know anyone, I won't know who to trust anymore, Sandor."

He realized that she was right. Despite her experience in L.A. and beneath all her cool cynicism, she was still naïve and trusting. If he sent her off on a Greyhound bus with a suitcase of second-hand dresses, how long before some other Tormund-type-bastard got his fucking hands on her again?

"I have a friend in Oregon," he began. "I used to live there, when I was about your age: worked on the Bonneville Dam. He served in the Navy; I met him again in the Pacific. He works in Salem now; got a wife too. She's Japanese; met her there and brought her here. That going to bother you?"

Sansa shook her head no.

"Might be I can send you to them. He's decent, so you'll have no worries about him. You'll need to find work; he's not rich."

"I'm sure there are coffee shops, or diners: it's Oregon, not the Solomon Islands…Sandor?"

"What is it, girl?"

"Do you…well, do you think I would make a good nurse?"

He looked at her curiously. "What's all this about now?"

"It's something I have wanted to do, since the war started. Of course, Cersei would not let me go to school or study, but that made me want to do it all the more. I could still work with veterans, or old people, or children even," she paused and furrowed her brow as she considered her options.

Sandor wanted to smile to see her thinking of her new life, and her old one. _Since the war started_: when she was still Sansa Stark, and so he felt hope for her now.

"I think you'd be good at whatever you put your mind to, little bird; and if I had to look up from a hospital bed, it's your face I'd want to see first thing."

"Let's hope not," she answered archly. "I'd have to finish school first, I imagine," she wrinkled her nose.

"There's people who work and study: it's hard and it takes longer but you've proven yourself up to hard work. There's nothing standing in your way now but you, girl; don't let yourself down."

"I'll have to change my name again, won't I? I'll have to start all over. Can- can I write to you…from where I'm going? Please, Sandor: you'll be my only friend."

Sandor could not help touching her again. He reached to take one of her hands in his, twining their fingers together. "Are we friends now, girl?"

"Would that be alright?" she asked tremulously.

Sandor gave her a genuine half-smile, weary though it was.

"It's a long way to Oregon from L.A….might be friends will be the best we can do."


	9. Chapter 9

They sat in silence for some time, watching the rain fall and listening to the thunder rumble as the storm began to move past them. Sandor still held Sansa's hand in his until she pulled it away. When he looked at her, he saw her cheeks were stained with silent tears and that she was wiping them away. He reached into his pocket for a hankie and remembered she was wearing his jacket. He moved toward her and she drew back instinctively.

"There's a handkerchief in the inside pocket, girl; might be it's as soaked as we are," he rasped. "Take it if you need it."

"Thank you," she murmured quietly and pulled it out when she found it. She dabbed at her eyes but still her tears came. She ducked her head when he kept looking at her. "I remember you hate crying," she apologized.

"Never thought it did no good," he acknowledged, "but I think I can suffer it this once. Nothing else you can do now: there's no changing what's past. Have your cry, girl, and move on from there."

She sniffled softly. "Oregon sounds pretty," she ventured hopefully. "I like nature: wildflowers and streams…" she trailed off quietly before speaking again. "I thought Hawaii was so beautiful when we arrived: a tropical paradise. I thought it would be such a wonderful adventure, that everything would be beautiful and splendid." Her chin quivered and she closed her eyes as more tears coursed down her cheeks. "How- why did it all go so wrong, Sandor?" she whispered now. "Was I a spoiled little rich girl? Did I expect too much? Did God punish me for having so much when others didn't?"

He shifted in the seat next to her, unsure how to answer.

"I don't know, girl," he began, "I'm not one for God or even expectations…I seen a lot in my life, a lot of it ugly and brutal and hard, and not just the war or police work. There are lots that like to hurt others, or use them; lots who are just plain mean or greedy. There don't seem to be any reason to it: just the way things are."

She sniffled again. "I used to think you were mean: you were so awfully hard."

"I'm honest; it's the world that's awful. You're right though, it did make me hard…hurts less that way, I figured."

"Does it? I tried to be hard: with myself and with others and with the world. I thought that I didn't care about the things that used to matter to me anymore; and I thought that I was doing fine, that I was surviving the way most people need to do," she smirked slightly, reminding him of her cynical coyness from their first meeting. "Fool. What did I know?" she mocked herself now.

Sandor considered her words. "You're not wrong about that. Most have to work hard and be tough to get by. You learning all that just came later and much harder, that's all."

"And lots of others have lost family now, because of the war; they've suffered and had to start over again. So I tell myself that it's not so bad…but it still hurts. My landlady had to leave her country a long time ago because of wars. I think she was badly hurt as well. She doesn't say so, but I think it's why she helps other women…" she stopped short.

"How does she help: she takes them in?" Sandor asked when she did not continue.

Sansa shook her head. "I forget sometimes that you're a policeman; I don't want to get her in trouble."

Sandor laughed, a short rough laugh. "And how could an old lady be in trouble? Is she dealing in contraband doilies? Is she laundering money as well as sheets?"

"She helps women," she answered simply.

Sandor turned to look at her suddenly. "You mean she-"

"Not like it's done here," Sansa rushed to defend her, "with wire hangers and bleeding and infections that kill them. She makes a tea with herbs, like in the old country; she grows them in the yard. It's much safer…and cheaper; you can see she hasn't much. Is that a crime, to help women and girls that way? You won't turn her in, will you, Sandor? She's been so kind to me."

Sandor was stunned. "And you've helped her with this? Of course you have, that's how you know." Another thought occurred to him. "Have you-?"

She blushed and stammered. "I- I drink a lit- little every day…so that…so I don't… It's the safest way," she explained.

"Well, bugger me, girl. You have learned a lot out in the world. Could be worse, I suppose. As long as she keeps it quiet, I can turn a blind eye; but anyone dies or turns up in the emergency ward and she'll land in jail, no two ways about it. Doctors working out of fancy offices in Beverly Hills may get away with this but not old ladies from the old country who work out of boardinghouses. Life's not fair, remember?"

"Oh, yes," she replied flatly with her old cynicism, "I'll always remember that, Sandor."

He sighed now and reached to caress her face.

"Hm. I told you you'd learn one day, didn't I? What all your dreams and beautiful ideas were worth? Do you think that I jinxed you, little bird? Do you hate me for it?"

She stared back levelly; then dropped her eyes sadly.

"No, Sandor, I don't hate you; but sometimes, I just hate that you were so right, then…and now. Do you hate having to keep watching over me?"

"No, girl, I just hate that I need to do it, hate the kind of world he live in sometimes. If I could I'd keep you safe always. But you have to go away, so I'll have to trust you to my friend. Tell me truthfully now: when does this Tor come back again?"

She thought a moment. "He- he said it would be six weeks before he got leave again, that means five weeks left."

"That's plenty of time. I'll write my friend, no maybe I should try to call him from the police station. You might want to pick yourself a new name; I'll look into getting you some kind of identification…off the record, of course." He thought about what she might need.

"Thank you for helping me, Sandor," she whispered. She thought as well. "I'll try to work extra hours in the coming weeks, to save more money. I don't want to be a burden to your friend."

"Rain's let up a bit," Sandor noticed. "I'll take you home now."

He pulled up later in front of the boarding house.

"I'll walk you to the porch; we're both wet enough already not to care anymore." He put his hand on the door handle and turned back when she did not move.

She looked confused. "I thought…when you said home, that we were going to your place."

"Aren't you safe here with him away? I'm on duty tonight but you can stay at my apartment if you need to; we'll just go get want you need."

She shook her head. "No, I- I guess I'll be fine."

"What is it?" Best tell me before I go, girl."

"I thought…thought you still wanted me," she admitted tremulously.

He turned completely in the driver's seat to face her directly now. "I will help you, Sansa; but there won't any price for it. I told you that I would always want you," he interrupted when he saw that she would excuse what she had said about the price of his protection, "but more than that, more than anything: I want to keep you safe."

He leaned and kissed her forehead, a comforting gesture, as Elder brother might have done. "If you decided you want me, girl," he rasped closely, "well, there will be time enough for you to think about that before you go. Now hand me that jacket."

She shrugged out of his damp jacket and handed it to him. Sandor got out the driver's side and put the jacket up over his head and waited for her to come out the same side. When she did, he held the jacket over both their heads and walked her up to the porch. The elderly landlady was sitting in one of the worn wicker chairs, crocheting yet another doily.

"Ah, you home. I worry you in rain," she looked them both over. "I right to worry," she noted. "Alayne, go have bath or you will catch cold."

"Thank you," she smiled gently. "I'll wait to hear from you?" she asked Sandor who nodded.

After she went in, Sandor stepped back and went to the end of the porch to speak to her landlady. She looked up at him, her weathered face a mixture of knowing and amusement, and he saw at once how truly wise she was.

"You like girl. This is good. But you worry too."

"I do," he told her. "There is another man, a young soldier."

She screwed up her face. "I see him. I no like. I no let him in house." She sighed. "But I say nothing. I can no be mother to her."

He looked back over his shoulder. "He's dangerous. If he comes back, you call me." He handed her a card. "If I'm not there, just ask for a patrol car and say he's trespassing."

She shook her head. "I no have phone. I hit man. Frying pan, or iron."

Sandor laughed ruefully. "Too dangerous. You watch out for yourself too."

She eyed him with her shrewd, warm eyes, dark purple like mulberries: eyes that had seen much and still were good and kind. He wondered how she had managed that.

"I like you, policeman. You good man."

"Maybe," he replied shortly.

"Good for _her_," she insisted.

He twitched his scarred half-smile. "I'm trying."

….

Sandor was filling out a robbery report for a downtown jewelry store, squinting at the list of stolen items made by the owner. Columbian emeralds, he read. He remembered the emerald earrings Robert Baratheon had given Cersei; he had said they matched her eyes. That was back when they could at least pretend to stand each other. She wore the earrings to his funeral, the bitch. Money did not buy happiness from what he'd seen, just Columbian emeralds. Maybe the girl would be better off where she was going after all.

He scratched in the necessary information on all the right lines: name, address, time and date, responding officer, etc. He signed the bottom and put it in an out-basket to be filed. A cup of coffee and a corned-beef sandwich sat on the corner of his desk. He glanced at his wristwatch: 11:57. Everyone else was milling about, sitting on desks and talking and waiting to go to lunch. He pulled his own food in front of him and began un-wrapping it. Suddenly, the room grew quiet. Sandor looked up.

"I'd like to speak with Officer Clegane, please," she politely asked the nearest man.

It was her, standing in the door of the squad room in a belted, bottle-green dress and her hair in those lovely waves under a purple hat. Second-hand, he thought to himself as he stood and nodded to her. She still looked better than whoever had worn it first, he had no doubt.

"Miss Stone," he greeted her.

"Officer Clegane," she replied formally.

"Please have a seat," he brought a chair over next to his desk. The others began drifting out of the room for lunch but most turned to watch her walk towards his desk and didn't bother keeping their observations to themselves.

"What a dish. What's she want with Clegane?"

"Legs like that should be against the law."

"Legs like that should be standard issue for every broad on the West Coast."

"She walks any farther and I'll have to arrest her for a moving violation."

Sansa politely ignored their comments; Sandor suspected Alayne Stone would have given them coy smiles. Once she sat down near him, she could not hide her yearning.

"Go on, you know you want it," he rasped.

She reached into his sandwich wrapping and took his dill pickle.

"Thank you," she smiled and took a ladylike bite.

"Now, why are you here? Has Private Tormund-"

She shook her head. "No. I've been working extra hours to save money."

"And?" he prompted.

"Tonight will be my first night off in a week; then I don't work again until the day after tomorrow."

"I'm not your parole officer, girl: I don't need to know your every waking moment."

She blinked slowly, languidly. "What _do_ you need?"

He arched an eyebrow in surprise at her sultry tone.

"You said that I could think about whether I wanted you…before I leave," she ventured now.

Sandor stared levelly. "What are you after, girl?"

She bit into the dill pickle again; she chewed and swallowed. "You," she breathed finally.

"Sansa-" he rasped low.

"I can even cook for us tonight. Hodor has been teaching me: simple things but good."

He looked down at his sandwich. "You don't have to do this, girl," he mumbled.

There was a silence that followed. "I know," she whispered. "Sandor, I want to."

He looked up again, looked at her beautiful face with her deep blue eyes and full lips in a gentle but uncertain smile. He wanted to kiss those lips again; he wanted to sink his hands into her thick dark hair. He wanted her to take off her ridiculous purple hat and keep taking things off until she was naked in the dimness of his bedroom, and warm and soft under his body.

He cleared his throat and pushed back from his desk then pulled his wallet and keys out of his pockets. He handed her his apartment key.

"Can you find it on your own? Good." He opened his wallet and peeled off a five dollar bill. "Is that enough for dinner? Pick up what you need on the way."

"Thank you, Sandor," she smiled genuinely now. "You won't regret it."

He barked a short laugh. "I know I won't." He looked at her tenderly now. "I only hope you don't."

She imitated his laughter. "I know I won't." She tucked his key and the folded bill into her little handbag, closing the metal clasp "I'll see you tonight."

"Damn right you will," he squinted up at the wall clock. "I finish at four. And girl?"

"Yes, officer?"

"Ditch the hat."


	10. Chapter 10

The breaded pork chops were dry, the mashed potatoes lumpy and the string beans over-boiled. Still, Sandor ate diligently while Sansa pushed her food around dispiritedly on her plate.

"It's not very good, is it? I'm sorry, Sandor: I truly thought I could cook for us," she apologized. "I guess I should have practiced first instead of just watching Hodor-"

"It's fine, girl," he replied automatically as he sawed through the chop with his knife. "I'm not so picky; and if you don't believe me then I'll tell you stories of what we ate on Okinawa; and how years ago I ate from garbage cans."

She put down her fork and gave him her full attention now.

"Garbage cans?" she gasped. "But- but- Sandor…where you truly so poor?"

He glanced up from his plate to see her looking distressed for him.

"I was," he rasped shortly. "Been on my own since I was twelve. Ate what I could, when I could. Rode the rails for a time. Did odd jobs 'cause that's all there was. Even begged once," he winced even as he sneered. "Never again: couldn't stand the pity, or the looks it got me."

"Because of…I mean, it was because of your scars," she asked haltingly.

"It was, partly," he shoveled in a mouthful of lumpy mashed potato and swallowed. "Thank Christ I grew big and strong and could work hard. Dug ditches, did roadwork and building; mostly New Deal projects," Sandor knew the wealthy loathed FDR but old man Stark had been his own man so there was no telling what his children thought. "No one messed with me either," he continued. "Learned to keep my mouth shut and my eyes straight ahead and to trust nobody." In truth he had learned to do so living with Gregor; not that it had been enough to curtail his brother's violence but it had worked in his favor out in the world on his own, especially with rough, older men.

Sans dropped her eyes to her uneaten plate. "Oh…I'm sorry, Sandor," she whispered. "No wonder you despised me so much," she remarked softly.

Sandor scoffed shortly. "What the hell do you mean, girl?"

She looked levelly at him. "On Hawaii: you despised me, at first anyway; and now I understand why. No wonder you thought me stupid. All I wanted were happy times and pretty things. Oh, I knew times were hard for some people: my father made sure we knew; but those were just stories on the radio, or pictures in LIFE magazine," she shook her head as though clearing it, "nothing to do with me or my life then. I sometimes think I must have got what I deserved-"

Sandor dropped his knife and reached for her hand, not gently.

"What did I tell you, girl?" he rasped harshly. "It weren't your fault; and people don't get what they get because they deserve it. Look at your Harry, or your landlady, or your brothers: the one who died and the one who got crippled. You think they got what they deserved?"

She shook her head vigorously now. "No."

"Good." He picked up his knife again and finished the last of his pork chop. "I won't stand to see food wasted," he admonished her as he indicated her plate. "You finish that or put it in the icebox; don't let me catch you throwing it away."

"Yes, Sandor," she nodded with humility. She began to clear their plates and fill the sink to wash up.

Despise her, he thought now, might be he had a little: the way she averted her gaze from him while being so exquisitely polite in every other way. His burned face and brusque manner had marred her pretty world, her hopeful ideas and expectations. She'd taken to Cersei and her boy straight away: they certainly fit the bill for pretty with their blonde hair and green eyes but they turned out to be about the ugliest thing that could have happened to her…until this Tormund shit got his meaty hands on her. But that hadn't meant she deserved any of it.

Even Gregor hadn't got what he deserved, at least not as much as Sandor thought he did. During the war, his older brother had worked as a guard at a Japanese Internment camp in New Mexico. Coming home late one night, he had been shot on the front porch of their family home by a local man whose sister Gregor had raped…or so it was said. The shotgun blasts had torn through his torso, leaving a gaping hole in his side. Still, it had taken him long hours to die: hours of screaming agony despite morphine because, like Goering, Gregor was addicted to morphine and could tolerate huge doses because of his enormous size. The man who shot him got life; some thought he should have got a medal.

All this Sandor had learned weeks afterward when authorities had finally tracked him down at Marine boot camp. Next-of-kin, they called him; and what did he want done with the body?

"Burn him," Sandor had snarled and hung up the phone.

"Burning?" Sansa turned away from the sink to look at him and sniffed the air concernedly. "Is something burning?"

He realized he had spoken out loud. "Might be someone in the hallway with a cigarette," he said dismissively.

She watched her now as she turned back to the sink to wash dishes and scrub pots. He let his gaze wander slowly up from her stocking feet and shapely legs to her round ass under the bottle-green dress. She had tied a dishcloth around her slender waist like an apron while she worked and it only emphasized her shapely figure. He pictured her firm round breasts beneath her clothes, rubbing against the silky slip she wore. Odd that a once-prim-and-proper girl never wore a brassiere but she had said she needed to buy clothes second-hand so maybe she could not afford one; or maybe it was the Marine bastard's taste. Not that he gave a fuck- Sandor snorted a short laugh through his nose now because he'd give countless fucks to feel the weight of her breasts in his hands and the hardness of her nipples through thin fabric. When she finished the dishes and reached up to the shelf that held the coffee tin, he was primed to pull up her skirt up and take her at the sink.

He cleared his throat. "Leave that," he rasped as she opened the tin.

She blinked in surprise. "Sandor, I _can_ make coffee properly," she assured him.

"Don't need any," he rasped. "Come here." He held out his hand to her.

She smiled a little and walked to him. He took her hand in his and pulled the makeshift apron she wore from her waist with the other hand and then drew her into his lap. He leaned close and smelled her neck and hair.

"You smell like a pork chop," he jeered and she giggled.

"I'll shower," she murmured and rose from his lap. Sandor held her hand until the last moment and let her go. When he heard the water, he rose to follow, shedding his clothes as he did.

She was humming in the shower, soaping her wet body and running her hands over her curves as she rinsed it away. She stopped when she saw him; and she looked up at him with eyes that seemed to turn a deeper blue. Her lip trembled.

"What took you so long?" she asked huskily.

He snatched the soap from her and set it in the soap dish before stepping under the shower and pulling her to him. He kissed her deeply and hungrily as his hands followed the same shapely curves she had washed for him. Sansa reached up and pressed herself into him as the water ran over them. Sandor broke their kiss suddenly.

"Ready?" he growled.

When she nodded wordlessly, he ran his hands down her back to cup her bottom and lift her. She wrapped her legs around his hips and panted as he grasped his cock and guided it to enter her and she gasped as he lowered her onto his aching hardness.

"Oh," she breathed out hot breath over his neck and raised her face to kiss him again. She bit his lower lip and dragged it through her teeth. When he kissed her again he slipped his tongue in her mouth and she sucked on it deeply as he raised and lowered her on the length of his throbbing shaft. He began to feel the same overwhelming frenzy he had felt the first time in the back seat of his Buick so he pressed her against the tile and, bracing his feet apart, bucked his hips to thrust into her harder. Sansa let her head fall back and moaned.

"Yes," she cried breathlessly. "Yes, Sandor!"

He grunted and groaned as he came inside her, bracing himself against the wall until he caught his breath. Sansa hung limp against him, her head on his shoulder, until she slowly let her legs slide off his hips and set her feet back down.

"At least I have practice at some things…" she murmured ruefully.

"None of that talk, girl," he admonished firmly.

He had only one towel and so dried her and then himself before wrapping it around low around his waist. He handed her his robe but she smiled seductively and turned to the bedroom without it. Sandor shook his head at her and followed.

She was sitting in the middle of the bed now, naked with beads of water dripping down from her damp hair. On her head she wore her purple hat.

"Do you like it better now?" she teased him.

He laughed out loud at her playfulness, his rough hoarse laugh; and then grew serious.

"You're beautiful," he told her solemnly.

She blinked and lowered her eyes, suddenly shy. "Thank you, Sandor," she whispered.

He came and sat next to her and reached to pluck off her hat. "You're beautiful…but I _can_ help myself," he reminded her. "You don't owe me anything just because I want you, and because I want to help you," he reached to caress her face with the back of his fingers and she grasped his hand and held it to her cheek and closed her eyes.

"I know, Sandor, but…that makes me want you _more._" She spoke without opening her eyes and so he put his arms around her and held her close. He bent to kiss the top of her head.

"Will you lie back, Sandor?" she whispered now. "Please."

He shifted to the centre of the bed and put his head down on the pillow and watched her. She reached first to outline his mouth with her fingertips and then bend forward to kiss him, her sweet breath mingling with his as she brushed her lips against his and nibbled gently. She kissed his forehead, eyelids and cheeks, giving loving attention to his burn scars. She kissed his neck and shoulders as she drew her fingertips down his chest over his matt of hair and circling over his nipples. Her fingers trailed over his belly and her lips followed and she gave flicks of her wet tongue on his skin. Finally she kissed and tongued his engorged cock as she circled her hands inside his thighs.

"What are you doing to me, girl?" he rasped hoarsely.

She sat up and straddled him now. "You said you liked watching me ride best…I'm going to ride _you_, Sandor," she breathed in her husky whisper, "and show you how much I want you."

She rubbed his hardness between her hands before angling him towards her and settling on him slowly. He hissed as he felt her heat envelop him and she began to ride him languidly, her eyes locked on his even as they grew heavy with lust.

"So beautiful," he rasped again.

"So good," she replied softly. "It's so good with you, Sandor. I feel so…oh!"

She let her head fall back and she began to rock her hips now, almost grinding into him. Her back arched and she flushed red down to her breasts. Sandor sat up and wrapped one arm around her waist to help her move. He brought the other to her breast, lifting and squeezing gently and rubbing his thumb back and forth over the taut nipple.

_Christ, she's good, _he thought wildly now; no other woman had given him so much, so well, so eagerly, and she was really only a girl. _It's wrong; it's got to be wrong: why don't I stop her? Why don't I stop myself?_

Instead he bend and licked her soft neck before latching on with his mouth, sucking on her skin and holding her tightly to him with his strong arm as he gently pulled on her nipple with his thumb and finger. Sansa bucked and jerked her hips uncontrollably now.

"Sandor," she called softly, "Sandor, I can feel it all through me… Ah!" She cried out sharply and arched in his arms even as he pulled her down over him from his grip on her shoulders. He came just as she did, in powerful spurts and a great spasm of release that made him groan through clenched teeth.

"Fuck me, you're the best," he gasped before he could check himself.

Sansa put her hands on the sides of his face and made him look at her.

"Do you mean it, Sandor?" she asked desperately as her eyes searched deeply in his.

He looked back at her, wary of her neediness and uncertain of her true meaning.

"Come with me, Sandor," she pleaded now before he could answer; her eyes were full of happiness and hope. "Come with me to Oregon, or- or any place else you want. I'll learn to cook, I can clean; and I'll love you, Sandor: just like you like it-"

Sandor's mind reeled then. _Harder, Tor,_ she had cried, _just like you like it._

He pulled away from her suddenly and she sucked in her breath.

"Sandor?" she ventured shakily. He could see the hurt and vulnerability in her eyes but could not bring himself to comfort her now.

He shook his head. "It won't work, girl," he told her bluntly. "You- you should go to your family. Forget Oregon; I only meant it to be temporary until you came to your senses-"

"But- but Sandor…don't you want us to be together?" she was beginning to sniffle. She was holding her hands clutched together before her, like she was praying.

He reached now to take her face, Christ Almighty, that beautiful face, in his big hands and spoke firmly and clearly: "You have family who love you, girl. Do you know what that's worth? Do you? It's worth a damn sight more than what we're doing here," his voice cracked. "Those boys…you're their sister, maybe their only sister now. They need you; and you need them."

"But I'm not that girl anymore, Sandor: you know that," she tried to reason with him.

"'Course you're not, girl: it's been years and there's been a war and you've lost your parents and oldest brother and maybe your little sister. Do you think how you are now is so far from how you would have become: you with your love of everything beautiful, your lively nature and love of horseback riding and beaches and soft silks? You've a passionate nature, girl; might be you came into too soon but it's the real you deep down and you know it," he almost growled in his throat. "There's no faking what you feel; and what you make me feel," he ran his hands up her arms to her soft shoulders, making her shiver.

She dropped her head and he saw tears drift slowly down her cheeks in the dimness.

"You think I need a lot of money; and want pretty things," she whispered dully, "but I don't need those anymore; I need _you_, Sandor. Why won't you believe me?" Her voice squeaked and he felt her tremble with suppressed sobs.

He pulled her into his arms now. "Hush now, girl: tears don't so no good, remember? Christ, look at you, you're so young. You don't know what you're giving up. Listen to me now," he took a deep breath. "I lost my family, all of them, including my own sister: the sweetest girl who ever lived…until you. There was no love and tenderness of even safety without them," he stopped himself from telling her the whole terrible truth, "and so I went out on my own. I've had no one since, not really. Go home, little bird: let your brothers know you, they'll be better for it and so will you."

"_I_ want to be the love and tenderness in your world, Sandor," she told him tremulously. "We're good for each other, and we'll be safe together, I know we will. You won't hurt me."

He sighed. "No, little bird, I won't hurt you," he spoke resignedly. "But I'm not wrong either. Promise me you'll think about it," he held her wrist in his grip and squeezed tightly.

She gazed at him levelly, even as her lips still quivered from sadness and unshed tears. "I promise I will, Sandor…if you promise to think about it as well. You see, I don't think I'm wrong either."


	11. Chapter 11

Their morning together was more subdued, though Sansa felt vindicated when she cooked them fluffy scrambled eggs and made Sandor strong black coffee for breakfast. She openly kissed him goodbye in the front seat of his Buick when he dropped her at the boardinghouse and the elderly landlady waved to him from the porch, blithely aware that the girl had spent the night with him. Since Sansa was helping the woman with the cleaning on her one day off, Sandor offered to take her out to dinner in the evening.

She wore same the lavender dotted dress again, straightforwardly telling him it was her best of the few dresses she owned. She seemed determined to prove to him that she could, and would, live with less. But Sandor knew there was a slinky, form-fighting dark number in her closet somewhere; might be the Marine had bought it for her though her doubted it. He doubted the cheap hustler had ever even taken her to dinner; only to cheap motels. He hoped never to see her wear it again.

The restaurant was Italian, a small place run by a married couple; there was no menu but only a nightly special listed on a chalkboard. They ate stracciatella soup, spinach-stuffed raviolis in a cream sauce and servings of rolled steak filled with cheese and parsley and covered in tomato sauce. The Italian woman told them it was called _braciole_ and that it meant 'arm'.

Sandor poked it with his fork when she walked away from serving them.

"Better not have been anybody I knew," he deadpanned.

Sansa giggled. She'd had a full glass of the Chianti that had been set at their table in a decanter and was pink-cheeked and glowing in the candlelight. "Mmm," she closed her eyes when she savoured her first bite, "whoever he was, he's much tastier than my pork chops. I should learn to make this."

"Or have your great-uncle's cook learn," he replied flatly.

Sansa's smile faded and she set her fork down. "Have you written to your friend, Sandor? I would still like to go to Oregon…even…even if you won't come with me."

He paused and then nodded. "I promised I'd write and I did," he replied. "They'll take you in. He'll ask around town for work for you. His wife is expecting so-"

"I can help," she chirped earnestly.

He was about to remind her that she's said she didn't want family, though she was clearly fond of children. That was when she was stuck with the Marine, he told himself; her life would be better now. It wasn't worth the dig.

"I know you can," he replied instead.

Inside his apartment door, she went down on her knees for him; then she had lain back on his kitchen table with her legs over his shoulders. She had licked her finger and circled her own nipple to excite him and it had worked; but his lust was tempered by the feeling that she was hoping to entice him into leaving L.A. with her. When she latched onto him and kissed him repeatedly in his bed, he finally turned her over, propping up her ass with a pillow under her hips instead of having her on all fours; but he found himself thrusting roughly and stopped when he heard her whimper.

"Sansa?"

She looked over her shoulder. "I'm alright. You're not hurting me," she whispered breathily. "I- I like it."

He kept on fucking her, uncertain at first but as she whimpered more and gasped and arched her ripe bottom to him he knew she was not pretending. She liked his tenderness well enough but he realized he did not always need to treat her delicately, for she was no longer delicate about such things. When she curled up contentedly with him afterward, he stared a long time at the ceiling before drifting off.

He opened his eyes when he heard her whimpering again. It was hot and dusty and he could not seem to move, or even get up. The sun was glaring and he couldn't see at first. He realized he was on the ground, the reddish earth patchy with dried grass that he remembered from his youth. He turned his head now towards her sobbing and saw she was on the ground as well, hog-tied and naked and Gregor was fucking her, he was raping her, hurting her terribly and Sandor couldn't move. _Help her, you promised to keep her safe; _but he was paralyzed and could only watch helplessly. Gregor had her by her hair in a tight fist and he kept pumping her savagely, making her cry and beg for mercy, which only made the big bastard smile and laugh cruelly. Finally Gregor gave one last brutal thrust and came with a deafening bellow of triumph, then plunged a red-hot branding iron into her soft flesh. She screamed as Sandor heard the sickening sizzle and then the smell hit him, the same smell as when his own face had burned: a smell like roasted meat.

He sat up with a heart-wrenching start and bolted for the bathroom where he vomited the last of his Italian dinner into the toilet. He gasped and spat then vomited again, gagging weakly before he pulled the toilet chain and rested his forehead on the cool porcelain.

"Sandor?" the girl called softly.

"Go back to bed," he rasped.

Instead he heard the tap running at the sink and she handed him a glass of water. He rinsed his mouth and spat again. Then she kneeled before him, in all her naked beauty like a sensual angel, and wiped his face and brow with a cool washcloth as she looked at him sadly.

"Is it the fire, Sandor?" she whispered to him as she put her soft hand on his scarred face. "The fire that took your family?"

He closed his eyes and wished at first to push her away just as he had always pushed everyone away. He told people curtly their house had caught fire and in a manner that brooked no further questions. No one knew the truth but him and his family, and Gregor had eliminated them one by one; only Sandor had made it out alive, so it had not been entirely a lie.

He put his large hand over hers and pressed it to his scars now.

"There was no house fire," he rasped bitterly as his breath came in steady pants. "My brother pushed my face into the embers of a rubbish fire when I was seven years old, for taking his toy and playing with it. When I screamed, he laughed at me."

Sansa gasped in horror but he continued. The truth seemed to want to pour out of him.

"He killed our sister the next year. Ran her down in the road like a dog in a truck borrowed from the ranch where he worked. No one suspected him because he wasn't old enough to drive but they'd taught him at the ranch: I knew because he bragged about running down dogs and leaving them to die in pain. He hated her because she protected me and she loved me," his face twisted in rage and pain now. "My father was killed a few years later on a stake-out. They had a man surrounded in his tar-paper shack and my father was shot but it was from _behind_. No one saw it, so they said a bullet must have ricocheted. But it was my brother, I know it was: he was just old enough to inherit the house and had been made a full-time ranch hand. I had to leave or he would have _killed_ me, do you see? Do you, Sansa? The world is full of killers. That's why I want to help you, to keep you safe. I know I can; because I know these monsters."

"Yes, Sandor," she told him in a quavering voice. "Let me help you, please." She reached to help him up from the floor and he realized he was shivering violently. Her deep blue eyes were full of tears and her lovely mouth was turned down: she looked so sad.

"Why are you crying?" he asked confused.

"Oh, Sandor," she whispered and her tears rolled down her cheeks.

She led him to the bed and lay him down and pulled the blanket up to his shoulder. He reached for her hand suddenly and she lay down next to him under the blanket.

"I'm here," she whispered softly. "Sandor, I'm here. We're safe together."

She put her slender arms around him and held him close. She put her head on his shoulder but did not sleep. He turned to her and gazed at her, at her overwhelming loveliness and sweet gentleness that was still there inside her, despite the harm done to her. How could that be? He could see the pulsing of her heartbeat in her neck and he reached to touch it, fascinated. He traced his finger over her throat, touching her heartbeat and her life's blood. Softly, she began to sing to him: a childhood lullaby he remembered vaguely from school about mothers keeping their children safe. But they didn't have mothers, not anymore; and they hadn't been able to keep them safe anyway. The thought almost made him want to cry: for her and for himself. He closed his eyes tightly and rested his head under her chin and listened to her beating heart. Sansa was still singing. When she stopped he pulled away. He felt utterly drained and weak.

"I should take you home now," was all he could say.

….

He dropped her at the boardinghouse again. He ducked his head when she tried to kiss him but she gently kissed his scarred cheek anyway. The wipers of the Buick squeaked and flapped as they cleared the tiny raindrops off the windshield in the early dawn.

"Shall I wait to hear from you then?" she asked tremulously.

Squeak, flap. Squeak, flap.

"I'll be in touch," was all he said and then he released the parking break. In the rearview mirror, he saw her run up to the porch in the rain.

Later that afternoon, Sandor sat miserable and exhausted at his desk in the squad room. A suspect had been brought in for beating his wife and children. All but the youngest one were in hospital. The man was big and fat and red-faced and he had kept shouting over and over that they were his, that they had no right to arrest him; that he could do what he wanted with his own property. Sandor had seen red and punched him hard in the gut and other officers had joined in until the chief had stepped forward to break it up.

"How did _you_ like it?" Sandor rasped angrily as the bruised and cowering man as he was led away to a cell. Other cops patted him on the back and shoulder for a job well-done but Sandor felt disgusted with himself and wanted a drink.

"Need to take some time off, Clegane?" the chief asked neutrally as he stopped by his desk.

"Might be," he'd answered in the same neutral tone. "Might be the bastard just needed a taste of his own medicine."

"Think about it," the chief had said carelessly as he walked away.

_Thank about it_. The girl had said the same to him but he hadn't really. Despite the plans he was making for her, he was still hopeful that she would return to her family, one day anyway. And where would that leave him? He didn't even have to look up at the room: the ringing phones, rough talk and vulgar jokes, an endless parade of suspects and victims and reports, reports, reports that did little good. Some went to jail or even to prison but there were always more the next day, the next week and the next month. The monsters were winning. It made him feel weary and useless. He wanted to stop those who hurt people but they just kept coming no matter what he did.

This would be his life without Sansa in it. There was a secretary downstairs he fucked when her husband was away, and a cashier at that new supermarket where he sometimes bought food who spread her legs if you bought her dinner or took her to a movie, but who was he kidding: he'd never go back to them after having the girl in his arms and his bed. Was it really so wrong that she should want to fuck him and make him happy; that she wanted to cook and clean for him? He wanted to fuck her and make her happy, to care for her and keep her safe. Isn't that what lovers did? They were good for each other: she had said so herself.

Just then the man from records walked by his desk and nodded to him. Sandor nodded back. At first he wondered what the man was doing in the squad room, in his rolled shirtsleeves and horn-rimmed glasses, zig-zagging casually through the maze of desks as though out for a stroll. Then he remembered. When he looked down, he saw an envelope sticking out of a file folder that the man must have slipped him surreptitiously. Sandor tilted the folder so that the envelope slid into his lap. Resolved, he stood and pocketed it in the inside of his jacket.

….

A misty fog had settled over the city after the day's incessant rain. All the streetlights were on and the inside of the coffee shop looked overly bright in the early evening. Sandor peered through the windscreen and into the front windows of Sunnyside's but could not see Sansa. He got out of the Buick and was about to open the front door when he heard her laughter. He walked around the side of the building into the alley and saw Sansa sharing a cigarette with the big night cook, Hodor. She quickly flicked the butt away when she saw him and Hodor turned around. He smiled and nodded to Sandor and discreetly left them alone, going through the side door under a dully shining yellow porch light. Now it was Sansa's turn to smile at him.

"I- Sandor, I'm so pleased; I never expected to see you today," she said.

"Or ever?" he rasped.

She looked up at him yearningly. "Oh, Sandor…if I could only take your pain away…and help you as you have helped me," her voice was getting thick with those tears that were all too frequent for her lately.

"What have I told you about tears, girl? Here, I have something for you." He handed her the envelope he had taken from his desk.

She took it from him with a curious look. Inside he knew that she would find a California birth certificate and driver's license. He had not even asked if she could drive.

"I know I told you to pick a new name but-"

"Alice…Carstark," she read and smiled up at him.

"Thought you'd like it. I found it in records from around the time you were born and had the i.d. made It's easy with the name of a child born and died the same year," he offered. The baby girl had died of abuse and neglect when she had been left with her uncles but he saw no reason to tell Sansa that. Still, she suspected the worst: why wouldn't she?

"Poor thing," she murmured and tucked it all back in the envelope and put it in her pocket with her tips. He heard the change jingle. "Still, I think I'll quite like being Alice…will I be going through the looking glass, or down the rabbit hole?" she teased.

He leaned in towards her now. "You'll be going to Oregon… and so will I," he rasped with a half-smile.

Her eyebrows quirked up in surprise and he thought she would smile but instead a look of terrified horror came to her face. "No!" she cried.

Sandor was momentarily stunned at her rejection, then he saw movement from the corner of his eye through the mist but before he could turn a sharp and searing pain tore through his side that blinded him and sent him to his knees.

_I'm branded,_ was his first thought, _Jesus, it burns…why is there no smell?_ He fell over on his side onto the wet ground.

Instantly Sansa's face was near his. "Sandor? Oh God, _help_-"

She was snatched away from him then, pulled back with a vicious force that made her yelp sharply like a kicked dog.

"Bitch!" a voice shouted. "You lying slut-bitch! I'll _kill_ you for this! See what I can do?"

It was the Marine, Karl Tormund, and he turned and kicked Sandor in his gut before dropping and plunging his knife into his leg and twisting the blade. Sandor yelled in agony now but little came out that he could hear. Blood pounded in his ears and he could only seem to breathe in short gasps of air. He tried in vain to get up but could not.

He heard two sharp slaps and saw Sansa's feet come off the ground. When he raised his eyes, he saw that Tormund had Sansa by the throat and was slamming her against the brick wall of the alley. He punched her stomach and let her drop before grabbing her by her hair and pulling her up to face him again. He put his knife to her throat now and Sandor could hear her frightened whimpers.

"Tor…no…please..."

"You like his ugly face, huh bitch? Slut. Bitch. I'll give you one just like it: I'll cut your pretty face so no one will ever look at you. Then I'll fuck you so hard you never walk again. You like that, huh?"

_Help her: you promised. Keep her safe._

"I brought you down in the dirt like the rest of us, rich girl, and made you _love it_, so now you're a just another fucking _whore_!"

Sandor struggled to get up but his lungs screamed for air as the pain spread through his body, leaving him helpless. He tried even just to reach his hand to his holster for his gun but his arm was stuck beneath his heavy body. _Braciole,_ he remembered from somewhere. He could not roll off it. Nor could he even speak. He was as dumb and useless as a pinned calf.

He heard tearing and saw the big Marine ripping Sansa's skirt and grabbing her pale thigh roughly. The knife was still as her throat and she was crying in soft hiccups. She had closed her eyes and put her hands up against the wall, submitting herself to whatever might come now. The soldier scoffed cruelly, satisfied.

"I'll bet you're wet, you slut," he muttered through clenched teeth.

Sandor was dizzy now and knew he was losing consciousness. When his eyes closed he forced himself to open them. He could barely focus. Then the dull yellow light over the back door was blocked out and he heard scuffling and grunts, and then the sickening crunch and crack of breaking bones. Sansa screamed. Then there was a dull thud of a weight falling to the ground and silence.

Sandor closed his eyes. After that there was only darkness.


	12. Chapter 12

At first he is only aware of bright lights in his face and tubes in his throat and body and pain, pain, pain. Someone slips a cold needle into the vein of his arm and his body relaxes but his mind is thinking of Sansa.

_Is she alive? Is she hurt? Is she safe? Where is she?_

With a depthless sadness and regret, worse than any grief he has ever known, he realizes that he has failed her. He has failed her terribly because he wanted her more than he wanted to protect her. If he had wanted to protect her, he would have sent for her great-uncle Blackfish Tully from the first and damn both the consequences and his own selfish desires. But he didn't, he didn't because she pulled up her skirt in the back of his Buick and he gave in to his want, not just that time but again and again. So he deserves this: this overwhelming, all-encompassing pain and this agonizing not-knowing because he has brought it on himself…and on her.

Then there are faces, some with white masks and some without and their words are far away and distorted and jumbled but it doesn't matter because none of them say what he wants and needs to hear: that Sansa is alive and safe. He needs to hear it so he can die in peace; until he does he will hang on through this wretched pain and agonizing emptiness as long as he possibly can, even if it's fucking forever and this is his own personal hell...multiplied times seven.

He doesn't know how many days and nights have passed but when he can finally open his eyes and see clearly, he swears that it is Elder brother next to him, his lips moving in what he assumes is prayer. He glances over and sees Sandor is awake.

"Sandor? Can you hear me?"

His voice is so feeble he cannot hear himself but what is asks is this: is Sansa dead?

"No, you're not dead," the man nearly chuckles in relief, "but you should rest."

Sandor wants to rage at him like he once did when he first met him in the vet's hospital, to tell him he's a stupid old man who knows nothing and is worth even less, even though he knows in his heart that this is wrong. Instead he slips again into unconsciousness, still not knowing.

He dreams of an unfamiliar beach, with the tide rolling in and high grass bending in the wind. There are patches of purple wildflowers beneath the grass. It's cloudy and cool. He hears Sansa's laughter but when he turns, there is no one there but him.

The next time he opens his eyes he thinks he must be dead because there she is, sitting next to him, her eyes closed and her hands clasped in prayer on his bed, like a serenely beautiful angel. Her lips are moving silently like Elder brother. He manages to jerk his wrist and she turns to him with a slight gasp.

"Sandor," she breathes a sigh of relief and excitement. She's different somehow but it doesn't matter: she's alive and he can let go now.

"Miss: it's time," a voice calls from the doorway. "Visiting hours are over."

"Oh," she exclaims. "I have to go, Sandor. But I'll be back, I promise. Thank goodness-" Her voice breaks and she leans to kiss his cheek before hurrying out and glancing back at him longingly and now he has to keep living until she comes back. So he sleeps again.

He's not sure if it is the next day or the next year but a nurse is bustling around his bed and opening the blind and he squints and grunts at the glare.

"Oh, good: you're awake, Officer Clegane. The doctor will come and see you today, to tell you everything you need to know. I brought the papers in case you want to read about yourself," she says inanely and indicates a pile of newspapers on his bedside tray.

But he nods and so she places them before him, along with a glass of water that has a straw sticking from it. She ratchets up his bed so he is not flat but not quite sitting up and he wonders what the fuck he is supposed to do like that. She leaves him there, giving him a cheery wave.

Glancing down he can see the headline halfway down the page of the L.A. Times:

**Ex-Navy Cook Saves Police Officer and Waitress from AWOL Marine**

And beneath:

_Dead assailant had record of fights, contraband, alleged theft and insubordination._

_Police officer is former Marine: in intensive care after surgery for stab wounds._

_Waitress treated for shock, cut to face. Police question girl and cook._

Sandor remembered now: she had a bandage on her cheek, high up under her eye facing away from him. Feebly, he pushes the paper off the top of the pile. The next paper underneath is from a few days later and has a headline farther up the page than the first.

**Waitress in Sunnyside Stabbing Case Is Missing Heiress**

_Miss Sansa Stark found after 2-year search and reunited with family_.

There was a photo of Sansa between a uniformed officer and a dignified older man with grey hair and the same eyes and nose as his great-niece. The caption read Brynden Tully of Riverrun Mining, Colorado. He was guiding Sansa by the elbow through a crowd; the girl had her head down. The story said that she had given testimony at the inquest regarding the attack on herself and Los Angeles police officer Sandor Clegane. She had said the Marine was a big, strong and dangerous man, armed with a knife, and that excessive force would have been required to stop him. He had threatened to kill both her and Officer Clegane. The night cook had broken the Marine's neck when he'd pulled him off her. Neither police nor hospital staff would confirm rumours that her clothing was torn and it was not mentioned at the inquiry. The Chief of police was quoted as saying the cook who saved her and Officer Clegane was a hero and merited a citation because one of the city's best and most upstanding officers may have died without his swift and decisive intervention.

Sandor snorted weakly. One of the city's best and most upstanding officers stabbed by a cheap punk who snuck up behind him; he wondered if anyone else would see how ridiculous that sounded. He hoped to thank the man Hodor personally for saving Sansa when he couldn't. He pushed the paper off the pile slowly and paused to close his eyes and rest.

When he opens his eyes again there is a doctor in a white coat explaining his injuries and the convalescence in store for him. He informs him that the police department has put him on indefinite leave and that he will not be returning for some time; and even then possibly at a desk job. His leg was badly injured and they cannot say yet how well he will walk again but there have been great strides made in working with severe injuries because of the war and so there is still reason to be optimistic.

Sandor listens and nods and wishes for Sansa to return. When he is too tired to read newspapers, which is most or the time, he simply watches the door. The next day's paper brings more news.

**Stark Heiress Questioned in Hawaii Murder Case**

_Miss Sansa Stark feared for her life, lived under assumed identity_

Sandor had been right that she had never been a suspect. She had been thought to have been abducted and perhaps the victim of foul play or both. Well, they had that partly right, he thought, though the foulness came later. She seemed to have told them more or less what Sandor had suspected about Ilyn Payne and now Hawaiian authorities were seeking him for questioning in the beating of Sansa Stark, the murder of Petyr Baelish and the re-opened case of the shooting death of Eddard Stark.

There was a headline beneath: "Stark Family Tragedies" it read and the article listed their many losses and speculated about their lives and business. Some were saying they were cursed, that no family could suffer so much loss and anguish without it being the act of some sort of vengeful god or merited for being so wealthy and attractive, a sick way of nature evening the score on them. Sandor wondered at respectable newspapers printing such shit.

The shit from scandal sheets he expected. The cheerily irritating nurse brought them when he had read the others. STARK SCANDALS, the lurid headline blared. FAMILY DOWNFALL read another and included the Lannisters and Baratheons in their photos and stories. Some played up Sansa's bravery: living in a boardinghouse and working in a diner like any poor young girl on her own but always looking over her shoulder for a murderer who wanted her dead and silenced. But there were inevitably those who smelled sex and scandal and called her a young temptress, a teen-aged vixen who left a trail of dead men wherever she went: her father, Robert and Joffrey Baratheon, Petyr Baelish and Harold Harding, Private Karl Tormund and almost Officer Sandor Clegane who, according to their copy, was still "fighting for his life". They darkened their photos of her, making her lips and hair even more dark and sultry, and speculated on her life as Alayne Stone: on her own when only sixteen in sunny, permissive Los Angeles. Fortunately, all they had was speculation: whoever they were and however many one-time lovers the girl had, none had come forward to talk. At least chivalry wasn't completely dead, Sandor jeered to himself.

The next day, or at least he thinks it is the next day, she is there. She is sitting by his bed as though she had never left and when she sees he is awake her beautiful face comes alive with a quiet joy and what looks like it may even be love to his jaded eyes. He tries to raise his hand to touch her face but she takes it in both of her slender hands and kisses it and presses it to her cheek with a smile.

"Oh, Sandor," she whispers now, "I was so scared for you, scared that I would lose you too. But you're alive, and you'll be well: I promise I'll help you, Sandor. I'll never leave you."

He shakes his head. No. Her smile falters a fraction but she leans forward.

"Of course we can't leave together anytime soon, so I'll have to stay here in Los Angeles while you recover. I'll have to tell my great-uncle but I was waiting to see you first-"

He struggles to speak and at first only manages a grunt. Then he speaks shakily.

"N-no."

The effort exhausts him but he has to say it: now, before she does something stupid.

Sansa keeps his hand in both of hers and squeezes harder. "Sandor, please: nothing has changed. I-"

"N-no. Every- everything ch- change," he forces out. "Fam'ly. Go."

She stares at him and he sees the changes already. Her hair has been cut to her shoulders and no longer falls in sensuous starlet waves. Her face is clean of makeup but for a little powder and pale lipstick. She has stitches in her cheek beneath her eye and he can just make out the faded bruises but he knows that they will fade and the cut will heal and she will be just as beautiful as she ever was. He notices the high-necked blouse: white with black trim and a matching grey coat on the back of her chair that probably matches the skirt he can't see; and through her blouse the faint outline of a brassiere and proper slip. She is dressed as a rich, young heiress and a lady. He knows she has white kid gloves tucked inside an expensive handbag at her feet; he knows without even looking.

She sees him looking her over and she knows.

"I- I had to go to court, Sandor; and they put my picture in the paper. I needed to look…well, very respectable next to my great-uncle." She smiled encouragingly now. "I've told him about you, Sandor; he's very grateful that you helped me-" She stops when she sees his eyes widen. "Oh! Goodness, not everything Sandor," she whispers now. "He knows that you saw me and recognized me and tried to help me, and that you told me about Mr. P-payne in Hawaii. I told the police, and they are looking for him now…thanks to you."

"N-no thanks t-to me," he rasps bitterly.

"I don't understand, Sandor. What do you mean?"

He jerks his chin toward the newspaper on his tray and Sansa picks it up and reads the page he left.

"Hero cook in Sunnyside stabbing case trains as sous-chef at Hollywood Brown Derby," she reads out loud and smiles. "Hodor is very popular; I'm so glad for him, though they kept making him pose for photographs surrounded by pretty girls," she giggled. "Did they tell you he tied a tourniquet around your leg to stop you from bleedings, and pressed his apron to the wound in your back until the ambulance arrived? I was so frightened: all I could do was cry and hold your hand."

"He save you, n-n-not me. I pro-promise…keep you safe."

"You never saw…saw him coming, Sandor; neither did I until it was too late. Hodor heard us. You can't blame yourself, Sandor, please," she insisted.

"C-can. Do. M-my fault."

"No. I'll never believe that. You were good to me; you _are_ good to me, and would never hurt me. Let me help you now, Sandor: it's all I want," she pleaded with him, her deep blue eyes on his.

"No," he shook his head again.

Sansa dropped her eyes and then looked at him again, her face now sad and forlorn but determined.

"You say you didn't save me, Sandor; but you're wrong. You're _so_ wrong. You made me myself again, and even told me how I was always myself, deep down: you said that I had stayed kind, that I worked hard and didn't complain, that…that I had a- a passionate nature. You said none of the bad things were my fault." She reached to caress his scarred cheek now. "None of the bad things that happened to you were your fault," she whispered softly, "not your family, not Hawaii, and not here. You told me nothing that happens to us is because we deserve it; and now I'm telling you the same," she finished softly.

He just looked at her. She was still beautiful, she would always be beautiful; but she could not be his anymore. He could not keep her safe, not with a long convalescence and a gimpy leg and no future that he could see for a very long time. He had to make her go.

"S-s-stupid lil' b-bird," he spat out.

Tears welled up in her eyes and she pulled back her hand. "Don't," she begged, "please don't say that. You don't mean it, Sandor; I know you don't," her voice quavered and she sniffled once.

"Y-yes."

"No. You were going to come with me…to Oregon. We were going to have a life together. We can still do that, Sandor; I want a life with you. There's nothing to worry about, I have my trust and so we'll be fine-"

He sneered angrily. "Fuck your m-m-money," he rasped hoarsely.

"Oh, I forgot," she looked embarrassed, "you said that you only wanted me," she murmured.

That stopped him cold. He stared at her speechless. She was all he could remembered having wanted for so very long and she had been his so briefly and it had all been so terribly wonderful and so terribly, terribly wrong, he knew it had to have been wrong or why would it have turned out like this? He wished that he had died now because living with this was too much to bear.

"F-free now. Fly 'way, li'l bird," he managed to say.

She shook her head slowly now and her tears finally ran down her cheeks. He shook his head back at her, mirroring her movement.

"No tears: n-no good," he reminded her.

She dropped her head in her hands and began to sob anyway. "Please, Sandor-"

"Sansa? Is everything alright?"

She started and turned to the doorway at the sound of a distinctive smokey voice. A man stepped in and Sandor recognized her great-uncle. He was tall and had a quiet strength that was unmistakable. Sandor knew right away the girl would be better protected with him. She would have the life she was meant to have: the life of Sansa Stark.

Sansa leaned to pick up her handbag: fine leather as he had guessed, in a deep, dark red like the wine from the Italian restaurant. She rummaged inside it until she found a lace-trimmed hankie and dabbed at her eyes. Her great-uncle came closer and looked at her concernedly.

"Poor child," he said to Sandor. "Forgive her: the last couple of weeks have been rather fraught for her. First the hospital, then the police questioning and all the wretched publicity; though you have it far worse of course, haven't you? Forgive me; I'm Brynden Tully." He offered Sandor his hand.

Sansa sniffled. "He's still too weak to talk much, great-uncle Brynden," she explained and looked sadly at Sandor, "and I fear that I have burdened him far too much already."

Her double meaning hurt but he knew that he could not blame her for feeling that way; not after the way he had just behaved. But it couldn't be helped: he'd tell her she was a four-star pain in the ass if he thought it would make her leave with her great-uncle. But the man took her words at face value.

"Well," he pronounced firmly, "then we should leave you to rest. But I wanted to speak to you myself: we are very grateful for your help with Sansa, both here and in Hawaii. She has the very highest praise for you and so I know you did everything you could. We won't forget either. When you've recovered, there will be a place for you at Riverrun Mining if you are interested. We'll even send for you."

Sandor saw Sansa, who was pulling on her grey coat, look hopefully from her great-uncle to Sandor and knew he could never accept.

"Be f-fine," he managed to rasp with finality.

"Well, please do think about it. I always need good men that I can trust. I wish you a speedy recovery, Clegane, and all the best. Say your goodbyes now, Sansa. We need to leave tonight. There's a sleeper-car train to Boulder, and then a car and driver will meet us there to take us to the ranch." He turned back to Sandor. "Her brothers wanted to come to Los Angeles but I didn't want to interrupt their schoolwork; they had missed so much with all that has happened," he remarked sadly. "But they're beside themselves to know they will see her again."

Sandor nodded approvingly. "G-good," he said simply, looking past the man to Sansa.

Her great-uncle turned to look at her now as well and so she set her shoulders and mouth bravely and stepped up to the railing of his hospital bed.

She took a deep breath. "Thank you…for everything, Sandor. I- I won't forget you…ever." Her voice was thick now but she held her tears with a sharp intake of breath to stifle her sob. Her soft hands gripped the bedrail tightly. "Good-bye, Sandor," her voice faded to a whisper.

Sandor nodded, holding her gaze levelly. He wondered vaguely what he would have said if he had the ability to speak properly and freely. He couldn't think of anything now.

"'Bye, g-girl," he rasped weakly.

Sansa looked up to the Blackfish and he took her by the elbow and guided her from the room. Sandor saw her hesitate at the door and look back but he nodded again and she dropped her eyes and left.

He stared at the doorway for a long time after.

_She'll be fine, she'll be better than fine. She's with her family now._

_I did the right thing._

_I'll never see her again._

He had not even kissed her goodbye, he realized now.

He remembered the night she sang to him, and how he had wanted to cry…for both of them.

He lay his head back on his pillow now, and waited for tears but they did not come.

He slept instead.


	13. Chapter 13

EPILOGUE

The day was overcast with clouds and the dampness made his leg ache. Still he walked along the sand in his bare feet with his trouser bottoms rolled up as the tide began to come in. His limp was barely noticeable anymore, and he was more comfortable now in bare feet after so many months in sturdy shoes with crutches or a cane.

The beach was deserted in the chill and he shivered despite the heavy fisherman's sweater he wore. The wind blew gusts strong enough to bend the high grass that grew in big tufts just above the line of wet sand and rolling dunes. There were purple wildflowers jumbled in the grass too. He liked that, the wildness of it: the Oregon coast was nothing like the sunny, crowded beaches of Los Angeles that were completely cleared right to the edge of the road, leaving only enough room for hot dog and ice cream stands and parked cars.

Here he could be alone with his thoughts.

He finally stopped when he spotted a rock large enough to sit on and lowered himself onto it slowly; sticking his bad leg straight out in front of him. After a moment, he reached into his back pocket and took out the letter. He held it for a while between his palms before opening it up, almost as if he were warming it; or letting it warm him. The letter was on fine paper, crisply folded and the cursive handwriting was slanted and elegant, like a proper lady's hand.

_Dear Sandor,_

_I hope you don't mind that I call you 'dear'-_

"No, girl: I don't mind," he said out loud as he read.

_I also hope this will be the letter that you finally receive and answer. I'm fairly certain now that I understand why you sent me away: I know you think you did the right thing, and I love that you wanted to do what you thought was best for me…even though I still think that you were wrong._

"Stubborn little bird," he muttered, but he smiled to himself.

_Well, despite that I have put my time with my family to good use. I finished school with the help of a tutor, and with recognition from Miss Mordane's School back in San Francisco. Now I am enrolled in college in New York City: Barnard College. My great-uncle thought I should leave the (wild) west and have all the advantages of a very proper Seven Sisters' education. Funny, but I probably would have wanted the same for myself once. Long ago. But not anymore._

_I almost cannot bear to be among the young people my own age. I'm not used to them anymore since there was only myself and Rickon and Bran at the ranch. There were boys there for them to play with but I hadn't anyone, which was fine really; I wanted the quiet, and time to myself. I do love my brothers and I miss them now. You were right about that, Sandor-_

"Told you so," he rasped.

_-and I am grateful to be their sister again. But these kids at college, well, I have nothing in common with them. They are so innocent and naïve, just like you once thought I was. Girls in my dorm giggle and gossip over dates and dances and being pinned (that means a boy giving a girl his class pin to wear…not what __you__ think) and I'm not sure if I pity them or envy them. It's such a pristine world, Sandor; I just don't belong here. Well, at least I study hard; for want of anything better to do. I have gone out exploring in the city though sometimes; I think you might like it too._

_I wish very much that I could be with you. I wish I knew where you are, Sandor:. I know that you are not at your apartment anymore because the letters that I sent there came back to me. I could not believe that you would simply send them back unopened. This time I have tried the police department in Los Angeles, hoping that they could forward them to you somehow. I only want to know that you are well and happy, Sandor. I have been well, and content anyway, to be with my family. But I miss you, Sandor._

"I miss you too, girl."

It had been almost a year and a half since he had last seen her face, in the hospital with her great-uncle leading her out by the arm. In his heart, he still believes in was the right thing, the best thing for her.

_Sometimes, I like to think that you are in Oregon, like we had planned-_

"Not quite like we planned," he noted regretfully.

He stared out to sea now, remembering the long road he took to be here. He had stayed in hospital until he was able to walk again with crutches and to manage living on his own. There were regular sessions of rehabilitation at the veteran's hospital and since every task from bathing and dressing to climbing stairs was arduous and time-consuming, he either was constantly occupied or completely exhausted.

But then he started to get better; and as he did he had time to think. He had far too much time to think: he didn't have work, he didn't have any kind of a life or purpose, and mostly, he didn't have Sansa. And so he drank. Nothing Elder brother said or did could help him this time and he determinately wallowed in his pathetic misery and waited bitterly to die. But instead of washing up on the beach this time, he had instead woken up one morning on the front porch of her landlady's boardinghouse, disheveled and brutally hungover from a days-long bender. Unfazed, the crone took him in and fed him breakfast and poured him strong coffee.

"You drink, Policeman. You miss girl. Why you not go find her?"

"She belongs with her family. They'll take care of her," he rasped hoarsely as he clutched the coffee cup in his shaking hands.

"All girl leave family for man. Good man who marry and take care of her. You take care of girl before; why you no take care of her now?"

He groaned feebly. "Because I can't. Look what happened to her…to me."

She scoffed good-naturedly. "You feel sorry yourself. You blame yourself for what another man do. Not good man," she screwed her face up at the mere passing mention of the dead Marine. "Not your fault."

"In real life…the monsters win," he rasped darkly.

"Pfft," she waved his words away with a flick of her gnarled hand. "I have seen monsters, policeman, and run and hide from them. Run to America. So I win," she boasted mildly but with a warm determination in her eyes. "What monsters win? Money. Land. Hurt others. This is no win." She leaned in to him now with her shrewd, wise face and patted his arm kindly. "No one love monster. Not girl. Not children. Not even dog love monster." She nodded and poured him more coffee.

He didn't stop drinking; not then, though there were no more lost days and night running into each other. But her words haunted him. Sandor had no love, no girl, no children; not even a dog. He may as well have been a monster, a monster like his brother. He didn't want to be a monster.

Then one morning he had just had enough: he sobered up and left a letter for Elder brother and another for his ex-boxer landlord. Then he gathered up what little he had in the way of clothing and papers and a dog-eared copy of _A Farewell to Arms_ that he had bought and carried to the Pacific and back. He stuffed it all into his old Marine duffel and drove his Buick up the coast. He had meant to visit his old friend in Salem but he pulled over to the side of the road one night to sleep in his car and when he woke, he was met with the beginning of bright sunrise in a clear sky that turned bluer with every passing moment, just as her eyes used to turn bluer when she looked at him. He had left his car and walked towards the ocean, remembering curiously the night he had walked into the same ocean to die. But now, on this breathtakingly beautiful morning, he drank in the quiet and the beauty and the vastness of the Pacific and felt an odd lifting, a release of his pain and anger. He didn't want to live with that pain anymore, and he didn't want to die either; he wanted to live in this quiet, untouched world. Sandor sat in the dunes and looked out at the sky and the ocean for a very long time, until he grew hungry. He climbed back in the Buick and followed the road and signs to the nearest town. The welcome sign read Coos Bay, Oregon. He sat down in a diner and ordered scrambled eggs and black coffee, followed by lemon meringue pie.

Sandor stayed. He found a garage apartment on the outskirts of town. He sold his Buick for an old pickup truck with running boards and found odd jobs, jobs that he could just manage with his stiff leg, until he got work with the local police force as a night dispatcher. He took calls about fights and break-ins and car wrecks and passed them on to the squad room and patrol cars, and in between the ringing of the telephone and the squawk of police radios, he relished the silence and read books from the public library. The other officers laughed at him at first, then began asking what he was reading.

Once silence and idleness had caused his memories and his unhappiness and what he believed to be his failures to drive him to drink; now silence had become his refuge. He slept most days until his shift began and then often spent the mornings at the end of his work hours near the waterfront. If the world were quiet enough and he was still enough, he could sometimes just hear the echo of her laughter.

Sandor paused from reading her letter long enough to tilt his head back and breathe deep and listen for that sound of her rare happiness: the happiness that made _him_ happy. He could almost hear it; then he felt a nudge at his knee.

"Find anything, pup?" he rasped.

Sador looked down now at the Labrador that a patrolman had brought in one night after having responded to a messy fatal car accident. Only the pup had survived, in a crate with blankets in the back of a family car, and so it had sat in the police station trembling and whining and pissing on day-old newspapers until Sandor took pity on it and brought it home with him. The dog, who he had never called anything but 'pup', shook the water and sand out of his coat now and licked Sandor's hand as he reached to scratch between his ears.

"Go dig. I'm still reading," he counselled but the pup sat at his feet and stared expectantly.

_-or maybe you've gone someplace you like better instead, someplace that you never told me about. We hadn't much time together, to find out those things people know about each other. I don't know your favourite foods, or if you like music, or books, or movies. I don't know why it is, Sandor, but whenever I try something that I like, or hear something funny, or learn something new or interesting, it's you I want to tell. I feel like you are the person who knows me best, and always will. Do you ever think of me, Sandor?_

"More than you know, girl," he rasped hoarsely. Pup tilted his head curiously.

_Maybe I'm selfish but I like to imagine that you do, if you are at the beach maybe, or stop at a coffee shop for black coffee and pie. Did you ever eat that Italian 'arm' dish again, the braciole? I can't bear to; not without you there to laugh with me._

_Even if you don't want me anymore, won't you please take pity and let me know how you are? Has your leg healed? I worried so after leaving you in the hospital alone like that. You once said I could write to you but you never said that you would answer, I know; but you did say that we could be friends so, please Sandor, let this old friend know how you are doing. You can write without a return address and I will keep sending my letters to the L.A.P.D. if that is less bothersome to you._

_It would mean so much to me. _

_Love,_

_Sansa_

"I did say that we could be friends, didn't I?"

Pup looked up again, his eyebrows quirking.

"It's a lot farther from Oregon to New York City, but it might be friends would be alright, pup."

Pup wagged his tail.

It sounded like she could use a friend; though in truth, so could he. He would be her friend, and tell her the truth. But he wished she would make the most of her situation, like her great-uncle wanted. College in the city was not something to give up lightly: there was a whole exciting world out there for her, a world of beautiful things that she had once loved. Sansa Stark should shine in that world. He couldn't let her give all that up to live in a garage apartment in Coos Bay and pour coffee in a diner again, could he?

But she had said that she no longer wanted any of that; and certainly that life had not given her all the beautiful things she had dreamed of as a girl in Hawaii, so long ago. That life had nearly ruined her; very nearly killed her…or might be it was the other life, the one as Alyane Stone that had nearly killed her. Sandor wasn't sure anymore; he was only sure that her life went wrong when others had wanted to decide for her and even control her.

She had said that she wanted to be a nurse, not so long ago; just like the girl in _A Farewell to Arms._ She had said that they were good for each other, and Sandor had never been able to argue with that. But she had needed the quiet of her great-uncles' ranch; as he had needed the quiet of Coos Bay. They had both needed time.

Maybe, in time, if he saved enough he could buy a small house in town. She could have finished with her school and have become a nurse by then, and she could work for a local doctor, or the hospital. No need to pour coffee and add up bills and scrape by on tips like she had to do on her own. He thinks she would like pup too. As for him, he would always want her. He had told her that once and he had meant it; and he knew it to be true now more than ever. But he could wait; or he could let her go, as long as it was what she wanted.

In the meantime, they could be friends; just friends. Friends had to be better than how they had begun the last time; but there was no point in regret, just as he had told her that there was no point in tears. Might be there was no point in looking back now; might be the only way for either of them to go was forward. In the meantime, he could become the kind of man she might truly want, a man who would protect her and give her a good life; not fancy but simple and decent and hopefully happy.

Sandor folded the letter now and brought it close to his face and closed his eyes. He almost brushed his lips against the paper but instead he turned awkwardly and reached into the tall grass behind him. He plucked a purple wildflower and carefully re-opened the letter and placed the flower inside.

"You say you don't care for money but I'll bet you still like pretty things, girl."

He stood with a slight groan and steadied himself before starting to walk back down the beach. Pup stood as well, wagging his tail and letting his tongue loll out as he trotted along beside him.

"Come on, pup," he rasped. "Let's go home."

FINIS

* * *

**BONUS: For those who wanted happily-ever-after, an addendum to the epilogue. **

Sandor dozes with his arm across his eyes. He is still working night shifts and soft daylight fills the room despite the pale curtains at the window. He is woken from a light sleep when he feels a weight settles on the bed.

"Down. Off the bed, pup," he mumbles.

"Oh, is that any way to talk to the woman who loves you?"

He twitches a smile before opening his eyes. He reaches out for her even before he can see her. When he does look, she is hovering over him with her auburn hair loose and a sweet smile of her own.

"I should have known," he rasps. "Pup never wakes me until it's time for his walk."

"I already took him out," she murmurs and leans in to kiss him gently. Sansa lingers momentarily and then pulls back from him to sit up again.

He sees she is wearing rolled dungarees and his fisherman's sweater and is both charmed and irked by her presumption.

"What have I told you about wearing my clothes, girl; do I prance around in your dresses on my time off?"

"There's a chill, Sandor," she reasons, "the leaves have already started turning. Besides, I still have not unpacked all my things; I have no dresser yet," she observes as she looks around the room.

He knows she is right. Their little house is largely bare but for a table and straight-backed chairs in the kitchen and the wrought iron bed in their bedroom. Their belongings are scattered in half-opened boxes in corners. Their life is a work-in-progress, and they sometimes feel they are playing house.

They have been married two weeks. They had decided to put their savings towards the house rather than a honeymoon trip, and they both returned to work after ten days of what Sandor had jeeringly termed "fucking and fixing". Sansa also works nights, at the local hospital; she walks the wards and checks on patients and helps in emergency cases. She cooks dinner in the mornings and breakfasts at night before they leave together in Sandor's truck. They like their days together: sleeping and living while the rest of the world seems busy and far away. Their little house had an elm out front and evergreens in the backyard and Sansa wants to plant flowers in the spring.

"What have you got there?" Sandor asked when he notices that she is clutching a letter in her hand.

She holds it up now. "It's from Margaery," she tells him.

"Tyrell? How is the cosmetics' queen faring with your money?" he rasped sourly. In truth, he did not mind that Sansa had invested her trust with her friend; he had once said he did not want her money and he had meant it.

"She's doing well, Sandor," Sansa enthuses. "She expects that she will be able to take the Golden Rose brand to a national market within two years and that I'll have a return on my investment. She is selling well in department stores in the southeast and-"

Sandor laughs at the business talk, which is what most of their girl-talk has become. "I expect that girl could run the country if someone let her."

Sansa laughs as well. "I don't doubt it, though it is her brother Will who has won the congressional seat for their family's district. "

"The boy who lost his leg?"

Sansa sighs. "He's hardly a boy, Sandor: he's only a little younger than you are. Don't be that way…"

"Hmph," he snorts as he puts his arm back over his eyes.

Margaery Tyrell had reached out to Sansa when she learned that she had returned to her family safely and they had corresponded while Sansa was at college, first in New York City, then in Portland where she transferred after Sandor had replied to her letter and finally confessed that he had indeed settled in Oregon. They had been secretly visiting back and forth between Portland and Coos Bay until Sansa earned her nursing degree, but since Margaery was unaware, she hinted frequently that Sansa should meet her older brother, Will Tyrell. Sandor had suspected the ambitious Tyrells wanted Sansa's famous name and her trust fund but he kept silent. He was still determined then that she make her own decisions about her future, even if it meant he were excluded.

Thank Christ she had never given up wanting a life with him. He still cannot believe his luck some days. As she leans to kiss him again, he realized this was one of those days.

"Mm," she hums as she kisses him. "Would you like some lunch?"

Sandor caresses her face and pushes back the heavy but incredibly soft auburn waves. "I'd like some of my wife, girl," he rasps hoarsely, "so take off my damned sweater and come back under these sheets."

With a coy shyness, Sansa shifts on the bed and peels off the dungarees first. Sandor tosses them onto the floor and sits up. Slowly, Sansa lifts the sweater over her head. She is naked underneath: no brassiere, no shirt and she is holding her arms over her heads to show off her firm breasts to their advantage. She turns slightly to drape the sweater over the wrought iron railing of the end of the bed.

"Minx," Sandor mutters and rears over her, pressing her back onto the bed. He crawls out from under the sheets and blanket and settles on her, tugging her panties off as he does. She wriggles and twists beneath him, and he tosses her underwear over his shoulder.

"Hm, that's better," he murmurs as he feels her warm skin beneath his and watches her eyes turn that deeper blue he loves so much. He pulls up one of her knees and secures her folded leg under his arm; he rests the elbow of his other arm on the mattress over her head.

Sansa giggles after a moment. "What are you doing?" she asks because he is in fact doing nothing.

"I'm looking at you, girl," he tells her firmly, "and I never get tired of it."

She blushes. He thinks it a marvel that she still can; and then reminds himself all that is in the past, where it belongs. It was a long time before they bedded again, even after Sansa came to Oregon and they visited back and forth with each other. He slept on hard floors and cramped sofas while they talked and learned about each other again. He wanted her to like him, to trust him, and to want him. He told her about his childhood and the war; she talked about her family and school. They traded personal stories and discussed current events and exchanged opinions. They laughed and joked together and sometimes even argued fiercely: slamming doors and cursing. She ran along the ocean shore with pup racing after her as Sandor trailed behind or watched from the dunes, his leg never quite strong enough to keep up. She never minded though he did, but never complained. They sat quietly side by side with her head leaning on his shoulder and watched the sun set as the sky turned orange and pink and the ocean turned inky blue and black. She gave him Hemingway novels from Scribners; he consulted a bookstore clerk and bought her volumes by Robert Frost and Emily Dickinson that made her smile at his thoughtfulness. Finally, on a cold winter afternoon, they made love in his bed under the slanted roof of his garage apartment. Afterward, Sansa cried from both happiness and yearning as he held her in his arms underneath three woolen blankets.

"I- I never want to be away from you, Sandor; ever," she sniffled. "Please…please don't send me away again."

He held her tighter. "You sure you want this, girl?" he asked roughly. "You had better be damned sure…"

"Yes. Yes, Sandor, I'm sure. I'll move to Coos Bay so we can be together all the time. I- I-I'll find work," she stammered as she tried to convince him.

"You'll marry me…that's what you'll do, girl. I expect nothing less from you…and nothing more either; we'll live on what we earn, and not your trust fund. If you want us to be together, those are my terms: take it or leave it."

Sansa's crying stopped long enough for her to gasp in surprise and catch her breath before she sobbed openly from joy.

"Yes! Oh yes, I'll marry you, Sandor. I love you…I promise I'll make you so happy-"

"You already do, girl," he rasped quietly, "you already have."

And so it was settled, there under three wool blankets, and then on a unseasonably warm autumn day in a local chapel with her family present, including long-lost Arya, who now lived with Jon in San Francisco, and her brothers and the Blackfish. Chaplain John Elder officiated.

"Thank God," he could not help saying at the end.

She smiles at him in their bed now, his wife: Sansa Clegane.

"Look all you like," she whispers, "but I'm going to touch you."

She reaches to touch his face now, slowly tracing his features with her fingertips and then running them down his neck. She brings her soft hands over his shoulders to his chest and down his belly, making him draw his breath in sharply. Her fingertips circle the head of his hard cock, and trace feathery strokes over his shaft until she takes him in her gentle grip. She rubs the swollen tip of his cock against her opening, slowly back and forth so he can feel her wetness and warmth. He grunts faintly between clenched teeth and she laughs softly.

"I know you can do more than look, Sandor…are you ready?" she murmurs.

He nods quickly and she helps ease him into her. Her breath blows hot over his neck and she sighs happily.

"Oh yes," she whispers dreamily, "that is something you can do very well."

She reaches her arms around him now, running her hands down the smooth skin of his back before resting them on his bottom and pressing him into her when he thrusts deep and holds before pulling back again. He works her in this steady rhythm and watches her face flush pink, her lips tremble and her eyelids flutter. He shifts to let go of her bent leg and instead wraps both her long, slim legs around his middle. The iron bed squeaks loudly in the near-empty house. Sansa giggles and then catches her breath sharply. Her legs tighten around Sandor and she arches into his body. He quickens his rhythm.

"That's it, girl, give yourself to me," he rasps tightly.

"Yes, Sandor," she cries softly, "it so _good_ with you." She arches even further and keens and clutches his shoulder and bottom as he feels her tighten and spasm around his aching cock and he thrusts and holds and _bursts_ like floodwaters breaching levee in spring, filling her with his seed though he knows it is for naught. Two years, they agreed; for two years she will drink the tea that her landlady taught her to make, until they save enough between them to consider starting a family. They hope by then to be living a normal schedule, working days and sleeping nights and having furniture to fill their house…or at least a baby's room. He is fine with that, though he is near thirty years old. He has Sansa, and she has given herself to him; not because she needs him but because she wants him, as much as he has always wanted her.

He settles on her now, warm and safe and content; and they wrap themselves around each other and exchange kisses and smiles of pleasure.

"We're good now, aren't we Sandor?" she whispers and he knows what she means. They don't talk about the time before, the time when so much was wrong. They were so full of hurt and loss and desperate need and though they wanted each other it was still wrong somehow. Now it was right, it was good.

"Yes, little bird," he breathes out as he kisses her brow. "We're good now."

**FINIS**


End file.
